KOTA KINABALU: Sabah Wildlife Department (SWD) rangers detained seven people after dried bushmeat was found in a four-wheel-drive vehicle at a roadblock along the Keningau-Kalabakan Road yesterday morning.
The enforcement team assisted by six honorary wildlife wardens, stopped the vehicle for inspection around 7.50am and found it was carrying the meat of wild boar, barking deer, monitor lizard, mousedeer and flying squirrel.
The dried bushmeat was found inside a box and three plastic sacks in the rear bucket of the vehicle, a spokesman for SWD said in a statement yesterday.
All seven occupants of the vehicle were detained for further investigation, he added.
Meanwhile, a check by an undercover team of the department at the Nabawan tamu around midday yesterday found that most of the wildbush meat stalls were empty.
The spokesman said that tamu goers from outside the district who passed through the roadblock might also have refrained from buying the bushmeat at the tamu for fear of being stopped by the enforcement team on their way back.
“All vehicles coming from the direction of Nabawan were checked but none was found carrying any bushmeat,” he said.
Commenting on yesterday’s enforcement exercise, SWD director William Baya said it would be carried out in other parts of Sabah to curb wildlife offences.