KOTA BHARU, Jan 18 – The National Kenaf and Tobacco Board (LKTN) seized 21,000 kilogrammes (kg) of Virginia tobacco leaves, worth RM650,000, stored for transit, in Perak on Jan 3.
The Plantation and Commodities Ministry’s deputy secretary-general (Agriculture and Commodities), Datuk Zailani Hashim, said that the seizure was the biggest haul in three years, compared with RM111,421 in 2022 and RM291,133 in 2023.
“The seizure, at Lorong Pengkalan 7, Pengkalan Lahat, Ipoh, was carried out after three weeks of intelligence, through the cooperation of the Royal Malaysian Customs Department and the General Operations Force.
“From the investigation on the owner of the store, a man in his 40s, we found that tobacco leaves smuggled through the country’s northern border have been stored in the store as a transit for the past three weeks, believed to be illegally sold to cigarette manufacturers throughout the country,” he said, in a press conference at LKTN headquarters here.
LKTN director-general, Wan Baharuddin Wan Ismail, was also present.
Zailani said that all Virginia tobacco leaves, with a market price of around RM30 per kg, had been seized, and the case was being investigated based on Section 51 (1) of the National Kenaf and Tobacco Board Act 2009 (Act 692) for storing preserved tobacco without written permission from LKTN.
He added that the law stipulates that any person who violates subsection (1) can be fined not more than RM50,000 or imprisoned for not more than one year or both, upon conviction.
