Nigerian crime syndicates have come to dominate the cocaine market in South Africa. More than 60 000 Nigerian citizens have settled in South Africa during the past decade. According to senior detectives, a well-connected network of numerous small and autonomous Nigerian syndicates, consisting of five or six individuals, has been established to ensure domination in the cocaine market. Most of these syndicates operate from Johannesburg, but some have recently moved into more distant areas such as Sea Point in Cape Town. The individuals belonging to each of the many small syndicates each have their specific tasks and expertise. When cocaine supplies need to be acquired from South America, each member of a syndicate would have to make a financial contribution into a common fund for the syndicate. The network of Nigerian cocaine syndicates is well-established enough to know when other Nigerian syndicates have gone through the same exercise and when the time is therefore ripe to obtain another shipment of cocaine from abroad. Representatives from different small syndicates, normally the buyers from each syndicate, will then meet, pool their resources, and arrange for one individual to take over the responsibility of obtaining a shipment of cocaine from South America. The Nigerian syndicates have direct contacts in Brazil and in other South American countries. Most transactions are paid for in cash, although it has happened that such syndicates have resorted to the export of South African dagga in order to pay for cocaine. Upon arrival in South Africa, the cocaine would be divided proportionally amongst all the syndicates who have contributed financially to the particular venture.

No single, large mafia-like Nigerian syndicate is therefore operating in the country and no ‘Mr Big’ has been identified among the Nigerian crime syndicates. The enormous profits that can be made through cocaine smuggling make for a very competitive environment, but there is more than enough opportunity for every syndicate involved to make vast profits. Detectives who have intimate experience of Nigerian syndicates, after having worked with them, maintain that the going purchase price for one kilogram of pure cocaine was $2 500 in June 1998 in South America (cocaine of maximum purity is 90 per cent pure). According to the police, once the cocaine has arrived in South Africa and it has been sold by a syndicate after significantly diluting its concentration, the original one kilogram, now in its diluted form, is sold for $50 000. While some overhead expenses will have to be deducted, it is clear that enormous profits are being made through this form of transnational organised crime.

According to the police, members of the Nigerian syndicates who receive their share of the profits, tend to send most of their proceeds back to Nigeria rather than investing it in South Africa.