Top security officers in Siaya town were left shocked after they discovered bhang of unknown value just 3 kilometers from Siaya Police Station.
Police had a hectic time and spent the entire day uprooting the plants from an acre piece of land whose owner disappeared after he was tipped off by neighbours.
Siaya OCPD Bennedict Mwagangi and Deputy County Commissioner Robert Ngetich who led the operation said it was puzzling how bhang farming has been going on a few meters from Siaya town without being detected.
The Officers responded to a tip-off from members of the public.
The suspect who flew to his home on the arrival of the officers had been doing inter-cropping on the farm with the bhang which was almost maturing found planted within maize and groundnuts.
“We will pursue the owner of the farm up to his hideouts so he better surrender to the police station,” Mwagangi said.
The OCPD who got a tip-off leading police to the farm said there were indications that bhang was being grown locally and appealed to chiefs and their assistants to be vigilant in order to eliminate drug farming in the county. He says the suspect has been cultivating the crop for the last year.
"If they can plant bhang in Siaya town then we are sure there are more outside there," Mwagangi added.
Similar incident
This comes only 9 years after a bhang valued at Ksh2 million was discovered planted just outside the Siaya police station compound.
Police spent the entire day uprooting the plants along the police station fence from a three-acre piece of land that belongs to the Kenya Wildlife Services (KWS).
The then Siaya OCPD Stephen Cheteka was puzzled following a 3-acre bhang plantation on a KWS land.
A middle-aged man James Onyango who was nabbed while attending to the plants said the KWS had allowed him to cultivate the land since last year.
A KWS official who had been called from Kisumu Sergeant Hassan Abashoro confirmed that the land had been entrusted with the suspect whose late father was their staff to carry out farming activities.
"We had assisted him with the land that has been idle to carry out farming activities but we are surprised that he decided to plant bhang," Abashoro said.
