The Underworld Podcast - Africa's Pablo Escobar: Kenyan Kingpin Ibrahim Akasha

Episode Date: July 15, 2025

Ibrahim Akasha was the kingpin of East Africa’s heroin highway, setting up a massive tracking empire that stretched from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran to Kenya, South Africa and Europe. When he was gunned down in 2000, his sons stepped into the void, hungrier and even more violent...but also, more sloppy. They struck deals with Pakistani mobsters and Colombian cartels, turning Kenya’s ports into gateways for global dope. But their empire crumbled in a DEA sting straight out of a Hollywood script. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Seeful terms at mintmobile.com. May 3rd, the year 2000, in the Red Light District in Amsterdam. A slightly overweight, middle-aged man of Arab descent when the receding hairline is strolling down the aptly named Blood Street with his wife. He could be any tourist, out to gawk at the ladies in the windows or partake in illegal smoke. But he's not. He's the heroin kingpin of East Africa, Ibrahim Akasha, a man described by a Kenyan newspaper as, quote, the most important drug lord, a man so powerful that his name was whispered.

In Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Europe. He was spoken of in awe, a drug dealer extraordinaire. If you needed any massive shipment of drugs sneaked into Europe, Akasha was the man you turned to. It's Akasha that first realized he could open a new drug route to Europe, ordering heroin from Afghanistan to be sent to Pakistan and Iran, then brought into Kenya's massive port of Mombasa on ships, then sent overland to South Africa before it was brought into Western Europe and the UK.

It's turned him into East Africa's first real drug lord and made him and his family a lot of money in the process. Akasha is in Amsterdam to meet with two Egyptian brothers who own a bar, but that's not all they do. They're importing cogs in the European underworld, middlemen who help massive shipments of heroin move around the world. Except, there seems to be a problem with one of Akasha's recent shipments, a $2.5 million supply of heroin on consignment involving Akasha, and a bunch of Yugoslavian gangsters has somehow ended up in the possession of a Dutch gang boss

who is refusing to pay for it. Everyone is pissed off and the brothers are acting as mediators despite the fact that it's likely their era. Akasha is there to meet with them face to face and have the problem solved. But he never makes it to the meeting. Instead, a gunman on a bicycle

because, of course, in Amsterdam, calmly rides up and shoots him seven times. He dies in his wife. wife's arms. Everyone else in the deal, the two Egyptian brothers and the Dutch gang boss are killed within four years. Not two years later. 8.30 p.m., Thursday, March 28, 2002, to be precise, in Mombasa, Kenya. Ibrahim's heir apparent, his oldest son, Calmedine, is sitting in a land rover discovery. He's doing his daily rounds, checking up on some of his businesses that he uses to wash his money, this one, a gas station. His main business,

though, along with the rest of his brothers, is heroin. Still, things aren't exactly harmonious. Since his dad was killed, some of his brothers have been clashing with each other, over their father's money, over a missing hash shipment. Threats have been issued. Kamaldeen isn't too concerned, but maybe he should be. Because at that moment, a gunman, wearing black with a hoodie pulled up over his head, is sneaking up on him.

He gets close enough, fires three times, and kills him before fleeing. He's dead, gunned down like his father, not even two years later. Two of his brothers immediately arrive on the scene and blame another brother for the hit, though they'll soon cast blame on a Serbian gangster and eventually perform a citizen's arrest on him in a truly bizarre incident. Whatever the case, the Akasha clan is down but not out. Soon enough, they'll be back to doing what they do best and expanding more than ever. Says a paper by the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime, The Akasha brothers took over their father, Ibrahim Akasha's drug trafficking syndicate following his murder in 2000,

which had been trafficking Afghan heroin through Mombasa since the early 1990s. For nearly two decades, the brothers led this massive criminal enterprise, diversified into other drug markets, including trafficking Mandrax to South Africa and supplying Colombian cocaine to Europe, and developed interest in other regional criminal markets, including ivory, rhino horn, and arms. This is the Underworld podcast. Welcome back to the Interworld podcast, where two journalists who have traveled all over the world, investigating criminals, and definitely not trying to set up their own meth factories, bring you a different story of international organized crime every single week. I'm Danny Gold. I'm joined, as always, by my partner with an English accent, Sean Williams, who is dressed like he's going to steal my mobile phone and ride off on a Vespa.

You know, or maybe, I don't know. wear balaclava and go rob a guy's Rolex. What do they do now in England? Is that the move? Okay. Okay. Yeah. All right.

Right. I'm gonna, just so you know, it's like, I think it's below freezing right now. And I can't put the heater on in my little studio. So I have to wrap up. I've got like five layers on. That's why I look like a hoodlump. Yeah. That's the only reason why.

I was wearing a tank top in the studio, but I saw myself on camera and was like the Conexplicably. Never hear the end of it. So I'm rocking the Underworld Pod. merch right here. Enough of you, enough of you say you want to see the tank top, I think you're going to do it next time.

If we get enough votes, next episode, I'll just say, it's 95 degrees here, dude, you can't walk outside. Anyway, we have bonus episodes up at patreon.com slash anoropodcast,

or you can sign up on iTunes or Spotify to get those. You also get these episodes ad-free and early the night before they come out. Underworldpod.com for merch like, like this. And email us at the on-worldpodcast at gmail.com for tips and points.

as we've gotten a few ones actually that are that are good, which is, you know, different from the usual ones we get that are bad. So keep those coming. You may have also noticed that we have these awesome illustrated cold opens. That is thanks to Mary Lindstrom, who is insanely talented and has like impeccable, cool taste. It's a wonder she wants anything to do with us, but she's been, she reached out to us and she's been putting these together. And I think, I think they're awesome.

Also, friends of mine just put out a new podcast called The Work Behind the Work. It's about unseen labor in America and how it could be crippling the economy. So go check that out the work behind the work. I don't remember signing off on that plug, Danny. I don't remember that mean. But okay, okay, all right. Well, my friend just got promoted, so let's promote him. He got promoted.

He's a, I think he's a senior accountant now. So go him. I'm going to promote him. Go check him out. He's in the UK. People always want, they're always like, you know, if your podcast had more like LinkedIn entries, audio that you guys were doing in the best of the episodes, it would be a much

bigger hit. So we're going to start doing that. Email us your new jobs and promotions. Okay. So East Africa and the Akashas. It's a region we haven't covered much and that's because the sort of organized crime drug trade, I don't think it's got too long a history there. I think we've done some poaching

stuff and a couple other things, but it's not as developed as you would say or even too active a present, comparatively speaking to the regions we do cover a lot. You know, like the Balkans or Latin America. In fact, Ibrahim Akasha, the man who story we're about to dive into, he might have really changed the game as we're about to find out.

And shout out to Alex Epperly, who actually tip me off about this story. He set a couple other really good tips. I think it's a great story. Have you ever actually spent time in East Africa, Sean? Yeah, quite a bit. My first, I think it was my first proper reporting trip was out to, I flew into Nairobi and ended up in Somalia for a few weeks. and it was pretty insane.

I don't know if I'd necessarily recommend it, but it did all right. It did all right for me. There's a funny episode with a guy who's my fixer, who nearly got shot in the head, and everyone just acted the most calm. I'd ever seen anyone act outside of a drug den. So that was a bit weird.

Yeah, I always wanted to make it to Somalia to report there after reading the Zanzbar chest, but I never did. So cool. But actually, I traveled a whole length of East Africa on a bicycle a lot, like many, many years ago, literally camping and riding a bike for like five months because my uncle is this crazy adventurer

who started this tour called the Tour d'Afreak maybe 25 years ago, and it worked out when he was like 50 when he started it, but that's how I kind of got to know the area. And you can kind of see why it's not an easy place to traffic large amounts of drugs, although a lot of trucks, as we'll talk about, but not a lot of great infrastructure

in terms of the stuff that you need to traffic large amounts of. of drugs, or actually not even that much of a buyer's market, but we'll see that things are changing there. So, yeah, the drug trade, the illistic drug markets of East Africa, they really get going around the 1990s. That's when you have Afghan heroin starting to flow into Kenyan and Tanzania ports. Not a lot, but it starts to creep upwards. And most of it, it's not for domestic use, right, in East Africa, because, I mean, these are poor areas. The market and the margins aren't there. Instead, it comes into East Africa and then makes its way to South Africa,

and from there to Western Europe. So it goes Afghanistan to Iran or Pakistan, from there to the east coast of Africa, Tanzania, Kenya, Mombasa, then South Africa, then to Europe. Here's a quote from a 2018 report from a group called ENACT, which is enabling Africa's response

to transnational organized crime. In countries all along the eastern seaboard of Africa, from Somalia to South Africa, the heroin trade has become embedded in local communities and linked to political elites. The East African heroin market is best understood as forming an integrated regional criminal economy based on the transit of heroin from Afghanistan to the west and with a spin-off trade for local consumption. Along this trafficking route, much of the heroin is first shipped to Africa on motorized wooden sea-going doze?

Dow's? How do you say that? Dows, right? Dows, yeah, yeah, Dows. Built in the United Arab Emirates designed for fishing. The vessels are loaded with between 100 kilograms and 1,000 kilogram consignments of contraband off the Mokron coast. of southern Pakistan. The Dow's anchor off the coast of Africa and international waters, and foothillos of small boats collect the heroin and ferry to various beaches,

coves or islands, or offload it into small commercial harbors. Dozens of such sites are used for landing the consignments along the entire eastern coastline, which, you know, kind of sounds like some areas, I think, of Central America, but not, definitely not as big, because these guys don't have to worry about the U.S. Coast Guard, which they do have to worry about down there.

But it's kind of got like a, I don't know, nice little pirate element. to it. This has all sort of come about over the last 25, 30 years, and it's really increased since 2009 to the point now where local heroin addicts never really a thing in previous generations is becoming a big problem. France 24 did a report on it last year, focusing on the coastal regions of Kenya, like Mombasa, which we'll get to in a minute.

In that 2018 paper, it said Africa was seeing the largest growth in heroin usage worldwide, but I guess that's compared to other continents. Yeah, which I guess it makes sense. It makes sense to specify. They call this the southern route, and it's increased because the route to Western Europe via the Balkans is getting cracked down on. It's sort of like how Mexico opened up when the Caribbean route for cocaine got cracked down on in the 80s, and it's sort of, you know, it's like whackamol. Like things pop up here, they get shut down, they go there. So, Mombasa, Kenya's second largest city.

One-time capital city, it's a huge port city. I mean, we are talking goods and services for tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions of people across East Africa. and further inland. So lots of opportunity there. Yeah, really, really nice place. Like super chill, beautiful coastline near Melinda, which is also really nice. And, oh, man, it reminds me one of the best days, our best couple of days of my entire career was taking the so-called lunatic line,

which is the old British Empire lying down from Nairobi to Mombasa before the Chinese rebuilt it. And I think it was supposed to take, it was supposed to take, like, saying 16 hours or so, and the train broke down in a village half way along, and we just sat on the tracks for an entire day in a dining car, drinking bottles of Tuscar with like South African mercenaries, and it was one of the best days of my life. It was so cool.

And I think even when I got to Mumbai, I didn't even do a story. I just sat in a hotel by the pool and then went back to Nairobi. It was awesome. If I can do more stories like that, well, it wasn't the story, was it? It was just me. Yeah, it's supposed to be a beautiful tourist there.

I never made it there, but I did hitchhike from the border of Ethiopia across northern Kenya, which is like wasteland desert to Nairobi. And it was something similar, like, it was supposed to be, it was like a 400-kilometer trip that took like 36 hours with like a truck driver on amphetamines. But I'm sure, I mean, one thing my uncle talks about

is how all those roads now have been built up. Like, we were off-road for a lot of that trip. All those roads have been built up and paid by the Chinese so they can, you know, steal more resources as something as possible. But it's crazy. It's like a completely different trip than it was when I did it 20 years ago. He still does it. His company still does it every year. But wild to think of what's like now.

I think you can get the lunatic line now for like two and a half hours. It's crazy. It's completely changed there now. So yeah, Portaumabasa, giant port and the opportunity is there for these families based along the coast who had been there for generations as traders or importers. Usually you have like South Asian or Arab descent, you know, they had these networks already in place for normal logistical trade, import, export stuff. or even like, you know, we're talking cigarettes, fuel, things like that where you can make a buck. Says enact, quote, in the 1990s, families on the coast of Kenya who had or established links with connections to Pakistani drug networks and European buyers began to transship heroin through the region. These included the well-known Akasha family. Reportedly, there are other Swahili Arab families from the coastal region involved in the drug trade who are said to have kept a low profile but remain active and successful in the trade.

Arab coastal networks have several hundred years of diplomacy behind them, said one anti-corruption activist. They would never threaten you to your face. There is a grace to the way they do things. They cooperate with the drug traffickers operating out of Nairobi. Additionally, there's apparently a Kenyan coastal city. You just mentioned it. A beautiful vacation spot called Melendi that I'd never heard of, which is a hot spot for fugitive mafiosos from Europe. I think a lot of Calabian and Sicilians who have been going there since the 1960s and they've been heavily involved.

involved too, you know, they help facilitate these connections. Yeah, this is, um, you mentioned pirates before and it's like a real interesting place of Swahili Coast. I think it's like part of the old Arab empires from Muscat. And it's also the Portuguese ran a lot of that part of the world. So it was, it was like privateers, pirates, raiders. It's always been a bit lawless around that way. Yeah, it's an interesting area, fascinating.

But the real people who put this coastline and county on the map and East Africa as a drug trafficking hotspot is the Akasha clan and the godfather, Ibrahim Akasha Abdallah. His origin, it's a bit disputed. Most sources say he's a Palestinian descent, while a few say he's Sudanese. Whatever the case, the father comes to colonial Kenya from Sudan and before that he was in Iraq. There's not much information about what he does or did, but Ibrahim is a young go-getter. He's a hustler. He builds a transport business in Mbasa.

Some say he actually built up Kenya's national taxi corporation before selling it to the government. but his main business is called Acacia Transport, and it's going to be the main front for his massive smuggling empire. And one thing to know, I'd mention this briefly about trucking in East Africa and transport and why it's so important in a region like that is that there's really no good rail infrastructure or river infrastructure. You know, there's not a ton of airport infrastructure either. It's a lot of landlocked countries, poor last mile infrastructure,

underdeveloped distribution networks, so trucking and transport is of the utmost importance. You figure that out and it's easy money, but it's hard. Although I tell you from having been in these extremely untravelled rural areas in that part of the world, two companies that have figured out logistically, Coke and Pepsi. You can find a Coke or Pepsi in like the most underdeveloped, impossible to reach rural village in the desert of like North Sudan or Middle of Now or Ethiopia. But either way, the logistics of those companies, mind boggling. I think the only time I've ever regularly drank like normal,

poke is in the middle of nowhere. I think I did at last in Boganville because that was the only stuff you can get your hand on the island. But also, I remember that Hargeisa, which is the capital of Somaliland, which is kind of like a semi-independent breakaway part, Somalia, that the only factory that was there for like 30 years was a Coke bottling plant. Oh my God, such a cool place. It's like, now it's completely gone bonkers, right? Because the UAE is fighting over it, the Saudis, the Chinese. Everyone wants a piece of Somalia, even though Al Shabab is still kind of going strong. And the pirates are coming back as well,

which is good for the podcast. Yeah. Somalia, I think, is doing all right, right? My friend Armand Rosen was just there. Yeah, yeah. A big article on it. They're trying to... Yeah, there's...

Trying to function. They have a kind of weird thing where they're kind of like holding the piece together by making a bunch of packs with the different clans and, like, the terror groups. And they're just about sort of sticking it together with sticky back plastic. But it's a cool place, man.

It's really chill as well. Yeah, definitely. Definitely go there on Sean. recommendation. And then if you get in trouble, don't blame us. But I say all that to say this, transport, logistics, not for the faint of heart in East Africa. Strangely, though, in 1982, Akasha transport only has 12 registered vehicles, and a few years later, they're getting in trouble for not paying drivers what they're owed. So the regular transport, not so much of focus. The company mostly stays out of the public eye, while Akasha studies the transport business,

logistics, shipping, ports, land crossings, and works on a smuggling job. And his main focus at that time is gun running, small arms all over the region, which was exploding with little conflicts and wars, and there's money to be made. But gun running in East Africa, or Africa in general, is a tough business with lots of competition. Writes a Kenya newspaper, quote, when arms trafficking became even more lucrative as conflicts escalated across the region, arms traders such as Akasha found themselves fighting even more powerful cartels within the Kenyan government. So we turned to something that seemed less attractive to meddling. the drug trade. Shout out to Victor Boot.

I mean, that was his bread and butter, right? Shout out to Victor Boot. He was doing it in the 90s. Hard got it to compete with him. From political elites in Kenya, apparently involved as well. So Akasha moves full on into this. He's already got networks and he's got himself hooked up in Pakistan with people there who have connections in Afghanistan

where everything is being grown. And he maps it out. Speedboats, warehouses, repacking areas. He starts taking control of the port of Mombasa, which is no small feat. As the shipments get bigger and bigger, the speedboats make the cargo ships on the high seas, unload the product, and then dock at fishing villages where they're unloaded into cars and take into warehouses.

There's also stuff coming in on some of those bigger cargo ships. And he's going to become the main guy in the 80s and 90s, bringing in hash, opium, heroin, and weed into East Africa. And then to South Africa and then to Europe, where it's far easier to sell and you can sell it for a lot more. They say that from the mid-80s to 2000, every sizable drug shipment into Europe, East Africa, Kenya or the Horn of Africa, has Ibrahim or his family with some level of involvement.

He's basically becoming the first real drug trafficker baron or whatever you want to call it in East Africa. And he and his family get very wealthy and very powerful in a very short amount of time. He's one of these guys. He dresses impeccably well, I imagine lots of linen. He gets the massive villas, the expensive suits and watches, and of course, East Africa, so you know he's got the sickest land rovers. And he's trying to set himself up as the kingpin of the whole region.

wholesale to retail, not just the middleman for cartels and bigger drug lords overseas. He's even looking at getting into methamphetamine production in Africa. Weed plantations on Mount Kenya. I mean, these are the real Kenning Cowboys right here. He's got investments in businesses, the typical real estate portfolios in Switzerland, Dubai, Sudan, Lebanon, gas stations, hotels. One of the ways he launders his money is actually, funnily enough, buying treasury bonds. And surely, the glory days are going to last forever, right, Sean?

I mean, that's what we're all thinking, right? There's no way this could go belly up. This guy knows what he's doing. I bet that's exactly what you're thinking. Isn't it, Sean? Yeah, of course. I mean, everything lasts forever, right? That's the song.

That is the song. That is the song. Yeah, famously. For a while, it does look like he's untouchable. The Akashas have everyone in Kenny on the take. High up politicians, bankers, top-level judges. They're easily washing their money, and Kenya is notoriously corrupt banking systems.

They've bankrupted law enforcement, police chiefs all the way up to the top. In fact, him and his people are said to have bankrolled the 1992 election win of corrupt Kenyan president Daniel Maw, whose son just happens to be a business associate of the Akashasas. They become known for the incredible reach of their bribery. By the mid-90s, Ibrahim and his people essentially control the port of Mubasa, and they also become known for just not messing around and handling people that get in their way. Contrary to Abraham's rep as a smooth operator, they do make

some dummy moves. They like to kidnap people who get on their bad side, no matter who they are, including like a contractor who had renovated their house in 1994, who was abducted and beaten. In 1995, they actually abduct and kidnapped the assistant commissioner of police in Mubasa, who had gone to their house to question them about an abduction. He's held hostage for more than three hours. And apparently he's so shaken up by it, but he doesn't talk about it until 2003, years after Ibrahim is killed. So we're talking about the sons. Ibrahim has a number of them. I think he gets married three times

and a bunch of them join him in the drug trade. I think at last count there was something like 10. There is lieutenants. They serve as his muscle like when he first gets arrested for drug trafficking in 1996. They go with him to the courts. They act as his bodyguard. And they're involved in a physical altercation with journalists, which is kind of a black mark on his record.

Though they're able to eventually bribe themselves out of trouble with the courts, the publicity is good for no one. He had usually played the shadows under the radar somewhat smart, lived by a strict code of rules that kept him out of the spotlight and kept the people who could cause problems for him, either living in fear or paid. And this was a deviation from that involving his sons who we're going to see deviate from that quite a bit

as the younger generation often does. Which is why it's so shocking that, you know, he's arrested in the first place. He had everyone on his payroll. And then in 1998, another one of his sons is arrested in Tanzania for smuggling mandrax, which we've talked about before. It's a South African Benzo that has a huge number of addicts in South Africa

super popular there. It's smoked, and they refer to the pills as buttons. The son is jail, but released almost right away. The following year, Ibrahim's younger brother was arrested in Kenya with two Pakistani drug lords who had snuck in a bunch of drugs hidden in bath towels and drinking stalls. All three actually end up jailed for a decade. The whole Akasha clan is being targeted. Sons, uncle is the kingpin himself.

It causes Ibrahim to look for partners outside his circle, which is something he never really did too much. And he falls in with some bulk and organized crime groups. Here's a Kenyan newspaper, quote, Akasha's new business model made it harder for him and his family to be exposed. But it also took power away from him. The new reality became evident with the first shipment, a consignment of heroin delivered through the Yugoslav conduits to Munir Barsohn, who forwarded to the Dutch cartel led by a man called Sam Klepper. According to Dutch police records, Klepper wasn't the original intended customer for the consignment. Still, he refused to pay, triggering a chain of events that left everyone involved in the deal dead.

All right, so let's, um, it's a lot. Let's, let's start the beginning of this and unpack it. There's a Dutch crime boss by the name of Sam Clepper, and he mistakenly gets, maybe mistakenly, gets a consignment of heroin organized by Ibrahim Akasha. He refuses to pay this guy, Munir Barsum, who owns a bar in Amsterdam's Red Light District. This was also set up with a bunch of Yugoslavian gangsters.

It's unclear what role they play, but I think they're at the top. Klepper refuses to pay Munir, who is supposed to get the money. Back in Kenya, Ibrahim kidnapped, one of these Yugoslavian gangsters or one of their conduits, demanding the 2.5 million he's owed. But it's not clear whether or not the Yugoslavian is released or killed. All we know is that the Dutch group led by Klepper refuses to pay. Is that clear?

Yeah, I reckon it seems like Klepper is about to get clipped. Is that correct? Yes. I think actually Munir gave him the consignment, knowing full well it wasn't meant for him. So that's why in December of 1999, Ibrahim Akasha, along with his wife, leave Kenya on a fake passport and head to Amsterdam. He needs to see about that missing money and resolve the conflict with Klepper and the Yugoslavs.

Adding to Ibrahim's problems, he's also now technically on the run. At around the same time, this drug shipment issue is popping up. One of his villas and Mubasa's raided, there's a ton of hash found there, like a literal ton, and Ibrahim is officially a fugitive and on the run from the Kenyan police. Now, Ibrahim's called to Amsterdam by Munia's brother, this guy named Magdi, who's going to serve as the mediator.

him and his brother again just appear to be these middlemen a level down from Ibrahim. They own a bar in the Red Light District, and they're the ones who call Ibrahim to Amsterdam to figure this whole thing out. Magdi, though, isn't actually a problem solver. Well, not in the way Ibrahim would have hoped. Because that's when we get to our cold open and Ibrahim gets killed, gunned down in front of his wife in Amsterdam. The Yugoslavians assume Magdi had done the killing or paid someone to do it as order to buy Klepper, the boss of the Dutch syndicate who refused to pay in that first place. The whole thing is kind of murky.

But the Yugoslavians are pissed off. The Yugoslavians are pissed. A, because their man was kidnapped. And B, because they just lost their East African heroin connect. And C, Cleper still refuses to pay, even though they promptly kill his right-hand man. And then four months later, after Ibrahim Kasha's death, Klepper has gunned down as well. Magdi's killed a year later on the same street as Ibrahimir Kasha.

And his brother, Munir is killed in 2004 at a traffic lane. Right, yeah. Who would have thought that any of this would have happened when you'd say? still a ton of heroin. Do not fuck with the Yugoslavian crime cartels money, but you guys, you listen to the show, you know, you know all that already. I don't need to tell you. You guys have learned that lesson many times that we've mentioned it. Though in later years, some of the Akasha's sons would claim that they were at least behind some of the killings. I kind of doubt that. The Dutch police eventually come to believe that Mooneer sold the drugs

to Klepper and that Klepper ordered the murder of Akasha. So Ibrahim Akasha's dead. shock waves are sent through the Kenyan underworld and the port of Mumbasa. The media reports that he's a billionaire with a hundred million dollar estate, and now his sons are going to take over where he left off. There's a leaked WikiLeaks cable where an American diplomat describes what happens at the Kenyan ports, calling it, quote, a falling out among thieves over control of the port. And newer, smaller crime groups are now getting involved with everyone from Russians to South Americans posting up. Yeah, are the local terror groups working out of there too?

because this is like prime al-Shabaab al-Qaeda kind of time on the swahili coast right when um i don't know about mombasa but when the akasha children brother sons are eventually indicted there are statements about the fact about accusations of them selling guns to uh tal shabab oh yeah that makes sense so i don't know i think there was like a mombasa terror attack around this time i think right a pretty big one that killed a bunch of people now yeah it didn't come up in that research. But yeah, I mean, that would be when Somalia went crazy, right?

Yeah, yeah. Of course, the Akasha clan needs a successor. One son to rule them all, it's not like the rest of them are about to go get normal jobs. But in this world and family businesses in general,

you know, things are never quite that simple. At first, his son, Kamaldeen, who you might remember from the Cold Open, he's the heir parent. He's the oldest. He was often a bodyguard for his father. He was seen as something like a consigliary and he had the same sort

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or use the code Underworld 60 for 60% off. So he was the guy who everyone thought was going to take over, but as we know from the cold open, he soon meets the same fate as his father. And right when his brothers get to the scene, they blame one of their half-brothers. This guy named Tinta, who had apparently been threatening Kamaldeen in the weeks before leading up to his death.

Tinto was the one in charge of sort of diving up his father's estate after he died. He had been beefing with some of the other brothers. But making things a bit more complicated, Kamaldeen was also suspected of doing a big hash deal and cutting the family out, another reason why he might have been killed. That deal involved the theft of a huge amount of hash from a Serbian drug dealer who just happened to be a business partner of his father's. This is also in the weeks leading up to Ibrahim's death.

It's funny, when you put these stories together involved, pieces from like, you know, different sources and things that don't connect the dots. They don't sort of put these pieces together themselves. I'm wondering now if that hash found in the raid on the Akasha Villa that turned Ibrahim into a fugitive, if it was the same hash that was stolen from the Serbian drug dealer, I mean, that would kind of make sense. And also, if the Serbian drug dealer was part of the Yugoslavian crime organization that was pissed off with a, I don't know, it also seems relatively interconnected, right?

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Either way, Ibrahim had informed the Serbian drug dealer of what his son had done. He was pissed off. He had threatened both Ibrahim and his son. Eventually, the Akashas end up disregarding Tinta as a suspect and instead blaming this Serbian gangster. And bizarrely, they go after him, but in a weirdly legal way. Here's a Kenyan newspaper describing what happens. Quote, the Akasha sons waylaid them in November 2004 as they made their way to Nairobi from the Jomo Kenyana international. airport. In a bizarre case of citizens' arrest, involving a mafia family, they chased the car down, this is the car that had the Serbian gangster in one of his buddies, pulled them out, and drove them to the Grand Regency at gunpoint. They then took them to Central Police Station, where the two were charged with Kamaldine's murder. So instead of murdering them, they basically bring them to police, which I mean, I don't know, I guess my assumption would be they were scared of the consequences of killing this guy, like maybe scared of getting dealt with by the Yugoslavians. I also wonder, again, if they were the same Yugoslavians that were, in fact, just Serbian gangsters.

But I don't know, the way they're described by Ken Amita maybe was stuck in the 80s, who knows. Yeah, I mean, I can't speak to these guys' character, but I'm guessing a bunch of Serb gangsters wouldn't discern between a guy who shoots at them and a guy who chases them down and shops at gunpoint. I would probably, I'd probably do neither of those things. the whole thing is super weird, but the Serbian gangster ends up going on trial. He gets acquitted in 2007. They actually sue the Akash's for the citizens or asses I didn't know was something you could do in Kenya, and the murder of Kamaldin is still unsolved. Eventually, the family settles down, and Bakhtash Akasa emerges as the new kingpin heading up the clan.

And Bakhtash himself is a young go-getter, and he's got his right-hand man, his brother, Ibrahim Jr., who appears to be a bit of a hot head next to him, well, we'll get to them, a minute. In 2005, though, the Akasha clan pops up on the radar of the DEA, which as international drug lords go, especially if you don't chip anything to the U.S., it's something you want to avoid. Whoops see. In the fall of that year, the head cop at the Mombasa port calls a press conference and announces that he's broken up a ring of corrupt port officials who helped organize crime steal containers or confiscated products, which is something that seemed to happen quite often, and something the Akashas are caught bragging about on wires. When chemicals or drugs are found

and impounded by the port authorities, the Akashas will just bribe whoever was watching them and drive off with all the product, no questions asked. Anyway, three months after this port cop shaped things up, he's killed outside his home. And the investigator, this guy had been seen as the key to breaking up a new drug route that had opened from Colombia to Kenya, then to Europe, and the feds were fans of him. He seemed like he was a legit cop. They're not happy when he's killed, and the fingers start pointing right away at the Akashas. If why, that attack was in 2002. So it was like right on when all this is happening. It was an Israeli-owned hotel and several planes attacked.

By the, by the, by Shabab, right? By Shabab, I think, yeah. Yeah, yeah, I actually remember that now. Yeah, planes, planes in Kenya? I think so, yeah. Yeah, I remember them attacking the hotel. Wasn't there a shopping mall or was that years later? Was that like 20?

The shopping mall was Nairobi. right that was in that roby yeah yeah that was real big i remember because tyler hicks was outside and he like uh you know the famous times war photographer um and he like ran inside and got like the most insane photos that must have been 2014 or 2015 yeah i think you know uh jacob kushner i think he was also there when it happened uh yeah pretty crazy i think like a lot of people got killed in there yeah that that mall thing the the photos are are insane definitely look those up if you guys haven't seen them all right back to where we were we're nearing the end of the two 2000s, there's been some infighting among the Akashas as well as in Mubasa and in the Kenyan East African

drug game is kind of widening a bit. But the Akashas are still players. They're not the only player. And the East Africa to South Africa to Europe route has gotten bigger, as has the local market for drugs among them heroin. Rights enacted in that 2018 paper. In the mid-2000s, heroin use in the Kenyan counties of Kuali, Mombasa, and Lamu was rife. And heroin users could also be found in Kisumu, a city in the west of Kenya. In South Africa, it was only around 2010 that heroin use began to shift from being predominantly a white, middle-class drug problem and started becoming prevalent in poor, black, and Indian townships. So the drug market and the movers in it are starting to garner headlines internationally, and the local consumption market is starting to grow to a point

where there's a lot more money to be made than there was 10 years ago. And the Ancashas, they want to take advantage of this. In 2013, the clan are making power moves. looking to get into not just heroin there, but manufacturing of mandrax and meth, setting up factories as well as keeping up with heroin. They're also getting a little sloppy, and by sloppy, I mean the worst kind of sloppiness. That's right, Sean, they become posters.

Oh, thank God. I thought you were gonna say something about clubbing in Berlin, which is a sloppy, but different kind. No, this is worse. This is, they get on the ground. I don't know, you weren't there. Yeah. That's true. I don't.

Ibrahim Jr. does not share his father's sense of discretion. Kenyan media reports, quote, in February 26, 2013, after social media had calmed down about that year's Valentine's Day, and the roses received around the country and started to wither and die stem by stem, which is very poetic for a newspaper, by the way. Great stuff, Kenan Media. Ibrahim announced himself. He posted a photo of a pearl white Mercedes-Benz parked outside his palatial home in the alley. The next photo was a selfie of him.

straight-faced, holding bundles of $100 notes. The caption was simple, for de ladies. For him, Valentine's Day had just begun, which again, another amazing line, Kenyon journalist. So good. And from then on, he went on an all-out photo session on his social media accounts, displaying copious amounts of wealth.

He also does stuff like... Oh, that is. Yeah, it's great, dude. I mean, go look these photos up if you can. He also does stuff like post the photos of a guy he beat up, when the guy is lying in the ICU after he bribes the doctors to be allowed to do so, which I mean it's got to be a serious violation

of the Hippocratic oath, you know what I'm talking about? By the way, if you haven't watched The Pit, honestly, just incredible TV, listeners. Go watch the Pit if you can. Oh, God, it's just every day with this guy. Watch the pit. Watch the pit. Look, I'm my own man, man. I'm a free thinker. That's why I watch old clips of Curbed on

YouTube every day nonstop. Yeah, there's also a minute 30 clips of the Sopranos that you can just be watched for hours every day. Like I do. Every Sopano's death. That 30-minute video has been watched about 20 times by me. That reminds me that I forgot to mention a mistake I made it in a previous episode about the Sopranos, a relative of mine.

I was very upset about this. Demand that I made it make a mistake. I forgot to identify the person who was murdered by the two Italians who kill him in the driveway when we talked about the Sopranos like hit, which was Rossi, the mayor of Munchkin land, as he's known. So he was the one who was killed by the two Italians in that drive-by, and the Sopranos, like, hit that, um, what was that about? It's, uh, uh, I don't remember, but it's incredibly telling that the one correction you make on this show is, is actually about Sopranos episode. There have been other corrections, but, but that's a big one.

You know, though, when I read these reports of, like, the Akasha is being responsible for this unparallel level of bribery, never before seen in Kenya, I'm thinking, like, sure, like, judges, prosecutors, politicians, but emergency rules, but emergency rules, doctors to even get to the ICU and take a photo of a guy you beat up. It is truly like a new level, you know? Rough. Yeah. So they use this level of purchased immunity to do what needs to be done. Bokhtish allegedly orders the murder of a rival gangster in South Africa, no has pinky, and he shot 32 times and killed.

I mean, South African gangsters, though, are no joke, right? There's way more competition in violence than Kenya, East Africa. When Bactash gets the news, he's so over the moon. when he starts playing celebratory music, dancing and shooting his gun in the air. Now, the reason Pinky had to die is that he had sworn he was going to kill the Akashas after they'd beaten up his boss,

a South African drug lord who was also tied up in Kenya, a real mover and shaker, probably using the porch as well because he had a Kenyan politician in his pocket, deep in his pocket. So deep that this politician, after the beating, across the Akashas in the Mombasa City Mall and gets into a physical, like, fight with them

at one point wrestling, Boktash onto the floor before Ibrahim pulled a gun on him and threatened to kill him right then and there. To the point where it causes a scene in the mall, people are ducking on their tables and stuff like that. The brothers, of course, later go to the local police station, they bribe

their way out of getting charges. But in the midst of all this, the Akashas are actually really burying themselves. Because sometime in 2013, 2014, the DEA decide the Akashas are big enough of a problem that it's time to take them down. And they do this by sending

an informant posing as a wealthy gangster, who in turn introduces them to a second informant pretending to work for Colombian drug traffickers who are looking to move heroin into the U.S. And the Akazas who probably aren't used to, like, you know, serious law enforcement, they jump right in. I mean, if random strangers try to convince you to start moving weight into the U.S., when you've never done that before in decades of being in the drug game, you think that alarm bells would sound and, like, start going off. But, like, probably after decades of bribing their way out of everything and dealing with in

competent law enforcement, these guys, they had a certain level of hubris, you know, arrogance, hutsba, if you will. Another one? It's one more. I can't think of another one. That's all I got. That's all I got right there. But it just, I don't know, it seems ridiculous to me to be like, oh yeah, these guys who we've never met, they want to start shipping things to the U.S. and they come to us. Like, let's jump in on this, man. Like, why not? You know? It's the big time as America, baby.

I don't know, dude. for eight months, these two informants wear a wire and get the Incachas on a whole list of things. For example, one brother tells them, quote, we were born into wealth by our name. The name is big. And so whoever comes and wherever they come from and they say this name, they know we are drug dealers. I get the impression the youngsters, the younger generation, not that smart. You know, they say things about wanting to move top quality, heroin to the land of Obama, which not the most indecifable code, my guys. Like, not exactly wind talkers over here.

Isn't that Kenya? What? The wind talkers? The land of Obama. Nice. Nicely done. Reads an article in the San Diego Tribune, quote. He reached out to suppliers, including one in the Afghanistan, Pakistan region.

That road you've asked me for all these years. The road has come, Akasha told the supplier about the opportunity to expand to America. Talk to your partners, your people. The way has come in a proper way. And it's not just heroin and mandrax. They're also looking again to meth manufacturing, I think, as I mentioned. reads the DEA indictment. During a meeting in Wombasa, Kenya in April 2014,

Baktash Akasha introduces a confidential source via Skype to one of his heroin suppliers in Pakistan who said he could provide 420 kilograms of 100% pure heroin, which he called diamond quality for distribution in the U.S. thereafter in June 2014, Goswami, who's an Indian drug lord, we'll get to in the second, began discussing what the confidential source as his ability to procure methamphetamine precursor chemical

and to establish labs to produce methamphetamine for importation to the U.S. In a meeting in Wobasa in September 2014, Boktosh introduced Hussein as a narcotics transporter from Afghanistan who moves ton quantities of narcotics using ships. Baktash Akasha and Goswami described the supplier of heroin for their deal with the confidential sources, to whom they refer to as the Sultan as the top supplier of white heroin in the world. I mean, do you think at this point we could just kind of go into criminal organizations, organizations is like a KPMG kind of management consultancy because, I don't know, Skype.

I mean, there's plenty of red flags here. I reckon you could probably sort their operation out in an afternoon and charge them quite a lot for it. They're just not the brightest. You would assume they were, but I believe they probably get arrogant about it or high in their own supply. Again, though. For the ladies. DA indictment, so accusations, but I mean, they had tapes and tapes, so probably legit. And we'll get into who Goswami is and the Sultan are in a minute, but they're drug wards, basically, and partners. So Boktosh and Ibrahim Jr. End up arranging for 99 keys of heroin

to be delivered to their fake Colombian connections who are DA employees. And then two keys of meth, and the DA are just like listening to this whole thing. But they're about to move on them. They link up with a select few Kenyan authorities. They're taking no chances because of all the bribery and literally handpick the officers

that are going to go on the raid with them only days before. This is November 2014. They set up shop, a mansion across from the Akasha mansion, and then with everyone in place at 1 a.m., they raid the villa and confiscate all manners of electronics, phones, laptops, cars, while bagging up the brothers. Bactosh and Ibrahim Jr. are arrested that day in Mombasa, and apparently there's 500 additional kilos of heroin that are on their way, but the ship is turned around after the brothers

are able to get phones and messages out while in custody. But the Akashas don't stay locked up long, even though the DA and the feds are involved. Even into 2015, when an indictment comes out in New York federal court for planning to smuggle that heroin and meth into the U.S. that is requesting extradition, the Akashas are out on bail continuing to do what they do. And of course, that extradition request from the U.S. to Kenya stalls out and stalls out because, again, the Akashas have learned from their father, they bribe everyone, judges, prosecutors, cops, whoever they can. And they get right back to doing what they do. They're working with this Indian drug lord whose name is Vicki Goswami at this point, who must be. deserve his own episode. He's mentioned in that DEA indictment. And he's got a hell of a resume. He's a former pilot. He was making money hand over fist in the 90s, shipping cases of mandrax daily

to South Africa from Mumbai on planes. At some point, though, he gets arrested and does a decade of prison in Dubai. He's sentenced to life, but is, of course, able to bribe his way out. And when he gets out, he relocates the Kenya. This is around the 2010s. And at some point, he teams up with the Akashas. You thought this was your run club era. Turns out, it was more more of a thinking about Run Club era. The good news? Someone's marathon training is about to start. Sell your workout gear on Deepop.

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Sign up for your $1 per month trial at Shopify.com slash special offer. Okay, this is in... same, but I just remembered what I was doing in Mombasa when I went there, and it was trying to cover this story. Are you serious? I was like, yeah, I remember like, I was like, this is all ringing a bell, and then I saw that indictment. I was like, I know I've read this before, and I think I went down to Melindi, I went to a bar and spoke to a sex worker there at a bar. Yeah, you did. She was Italian. Yeah, of course I did. And she was Italian, and she worked for the mafia, the Sicilian mafia. And so there were loads of, there were loads of mobsters from Europe rocking up there and trying to get in on

this exact drug route. And I remember trying to look into it and it was fucking scary. But, yeah, I mean, I did nothing with it. But now I remember what I was doing for a few hours in Melindi. And it's, it's trying to do this, which I failed to do. Did Goswami get his name come up? Do you remember or no? I don't remember that. No. Did he come up in one of your episodes about the new Indian dons that we did? Like early on. Yeah, mate, I feel like he might have come up in one of, he's probably come up in one of our shows. We've done so many of these, but, um, sounds like an interesting character, man. I'm sure this is fascinating story.

He claims at one point that Indian, uh, India's intelligence tried to hire him to kill Dawood Ibrahim, which is why I brought up on that episode. Oh, nuts. Yeah, I mean, probably. I wouldn't put it past them. Yeah. So that's, um, something we need to, we need to, uh, I mean, I saved a couple of big articles about him, so it'd be super fascinating to look into that more.

Speaking of Dubai, yeah. One of their plans involves building a meth factory in Mozambique, and in 2016, the Indian police traced a number of massive shipments of aphedron, which is one of the primary chemicals used to make meth to Goswami. But he's already wrapped up, as we'll see. Writes one Kenya newspaper, almost every drug hall in Kenny of the last 15 years, and there have been many, have had suspected links to the new dons of the Akasha clan. Although there are now new players in the business, most of whom cut their teeth under the elder Ibrahim Akashia, the clan remains one of the primary players. Wright's another. Other than South Africa,

the Akasha's invested in a Mandrax operation in Zimbabwe, worked with heroin traffickers in Tanzania, and bought weapons from the Al-Shabab terror group. The U.S. government's case also mentioned, the U.S. government's case also mentioned that the traffickers met the Ugandan president's sister-in-law to discuss methods of illegally importing effigrant into Uganda. It is reputed she agreed to provide a license in exchange for percentage of the profits.

So the Kenyan authorities of course, course, on the Take 2, the Akashas that bribed things up so nicely, they no longer feel any pretense about needing to lay low. They're actively setting up meth factories and moving weight all over, but according to an article in the San Diego Tribune, they go a step too far, and they get involved with selling poached ivory, which I mean, honestly, dude, like, heroin is one thing, killing a rival dope dealer, whatever, but like, if you're involved in killing rhinos and elephants, dude, like, that's just too far. Like, they should go after you, you know? Yeah, man, that reminds me. I've got like an exclusive coming up on this show.

I don't know if I'm going to make it a main show yet, but there's a guy in Zimbabwe who's basically an African Joe Exotic, who is in the bloodline business. It's really, really cool. I've been looking into it for ages through a listener, actually. So shout out to that guy. But yeah, that's nuts, man. I'll be doing it soon. Dude, poachers, man. Like honestly, they mean, especially the ones who go up the rhinos, too. Come back. Anyway, this story from the San Diego Tribune is wild. I don't, the merits of it, who knows, but it details how two women, one of former Department of Defense employee and the other a journal.

Together they leave their jobs and create the center on illicit networks and transnational organized crime, Sintock, which great name, which they first focus on poaching in Africa. And they do this first big project on ivory trafficking routes in East and South Africa. And they partner up with an AI company called Semantic, reads the article, quote, they started as they often do with records. They'd go to local cops, magistrate judges, rangers, even poachers in jail, and come away with leaked seizure documents, shipping manifest, company registries, comparable feel notes, social media tips, and cell phone records. One by one, the intel, some of it in Swahili, some of it handwritten, would be entered into

semantics program. They worked up the supply chain, mapping the ivory trail from Tanzania, where the elephants were slaughtered to Mombasa for shipment to Asia, where ivory remains at high demand. The woman also started to see a distinct overlap of front companies used to export ivory also used to traffic drugs. It led back to the Akashas. Wow, GPT does investigative journalism. I mean, who knows, dude, but we should work for them. Anyway, so killing elephants for the Tuss in Africa and selling it in Asia is not something U.S. federal agencies tend to get involved with. But the woman had all these info that they showed, that showed drag.

drug trafficking evidence as well, and they start helping the feds who are already interested in the Akashas map everything out. They're able to tie 30 tons of ivory trafficking to the Akashas. And with the extradition stuff all tied up in the corrupt Kenyan system, according to this article, the DEA realizes that ivory trafficking might carry more weight there, even though it doesn't matter in the U.S. says the Tribune, quote, the ivory evidence ultimately provided the political will for the extradition. They got the U.S. governments and Kenyan government's attention. The extradition became politically expedient for the president of Kenya, a win-win for him. The ambassador of Kenya at that time was very pro-elephant.

We were able to go in behind the scenes and get saved the elephants to advocate for the extradition. I'm pro-elephant. Someone being pro-elephant means that there's probably someone who's anti-elephant. Right? You don't see them on the streets these days, but maybe they're organized. I'm very pro-elphent. I wouldn't tolerate someone who was anti-elephant, to be honest with you. Okay, so January of 2017, the U.S. feds apparently get sick of waiting around.

The Kenyans are on board because some of the Kenyans are in board because the Ivy trafficking, and they get it together. They move on them on January 27th. They get the Akasha brothers, and they don't think any chances this time. Within three days, they're bundled up and shipped to the U.S. rapid fire extradition. I think some people in Kenya were likely pissed off. Later, they get this Pakistani drug lord known as the Sultan exorated to the U.S. that had been providing them with heroin. He's arrested in London.

He was a high roller there on the polo circuit just like a young Sean Williams, and he owned a 5 million pound house in Berkshire, which I assume is nice. I like that one. I like being rich in polo player instead of a degenerate sex addict, which I usually am in this show.

Have you spent time on the polo circuit? No, but I'm about to move to Buenos Aires, so, you know, that's that's going to happen. Yes, it's massive. The circuit doesn't interest me, but like, whacking things with the croaking. came out while on a horse does seem pretty cool. Yeah, it looks quite fun and also extremely dangerous.

My, my missus really wants to do it, and I don't know about that, man. This looks dangerous. Can you, can you hit people with your extra long course? I mean, I guess, I guess accidentally, not accidentally. Yeah, sure. But you might also hit a horse in the face, so that's not fun. Yeah, the horses must be insane. I'm going to watch them some, uh, some polo.

But interestingly, there's some analysis I've seen that said the Akashas had stopped paying their requisite bribes to politicians and they'll lead up to their rapid fire tradition. But who knows if that's true? Once in the U.S. system, Goswami turned state's evidence, and I think the Sultan does too. Like we said, you know, there's eight months of informants wearing wires. Like, you don't stand a chance. They're all locked down. In 2018, Baktash and Ibrahim Jr. plead guilty to the U.S. drug trafficking in charges.

2019, Boktash gets sentenced to 25 years. Ibrahim, I think it's 23 years, and the Akasha clan pretty much wiped out, but the drug trading East Africa is still growing. Here's a last quote from that enact paper. In Kenya, drug traffickers have decided to campaign directly for political office. In Mozambique, drug traffickers have consolidated their hold over the market in a remarkably resilient and longstanding quid pro quo with the political elite. In these countries, heroin profits play discrete and identifiable role in providing campaign and

patronage finance to political figures. So still going off in East Africa, lots of money being made, lots of politicians being bribed. All right. Africa is corrupt. Is that the TLD? I mean, I think we are TLD, whatever D.R is, everywhere is pretty much corrupt. But, you know, if you can bribe politicians in rich countries, probably bribe politicians in poor countries, you know? Yeah, correct.

Yeah, TLDR, yeah. Anyway, Patreon.com slash general world podcast. Sorry, my throat's going out. and sign up for bonus episodes, sign up for early episodes, ad-free episodes, and that's it. Ambition comes in all shapes and sizes. At First Citizens Bank, we roll with your goals because we're built for what you're building. Fit for your ambition for Citizens Bank.