Caledonspoort - Nine police officers were arrested, along with seven other people, for fraud and corruption at the Caledonspoort border post on Tuesday, the Hawks said.
Spokesman Captain Paul Ramaloko said of the seven, six were immigration officers and one an official from the health department.
The officials allegedly allowed people to enter the country from Lesotho without documents and charged them R150 each.
“In some instances taxi drivers delivered passports at the port of entry to be stamped, in order to extend the days of holders in SA, at a fee of R150,” he said.
“This had been orchestrated for a long time. The officials were able to make over R100 000 per day. At one instance officials shared R200 000.”
He said people without passports arrived at the border in a bus and a police officer entered the bus and counted them.
“Each person was charged R150 or R200 and the bus was allowed to enter SA.”
Police confiscated R38 000 found in the boot of a car belonging to one of the immigration officials.
The group was expected to appear in the Fouriesburg Magistrate's Court on Wednesday.
Ramaloko said they were arrested on duty at the port of entry. One of the police officers was arrested at a hospital, where he had been booked in for alcohol abuse.
The head of the Hawks in the Free State, Maj-Gen Senaba Mositi, said the arrests were part of the police's quest to stop corruption in the province. - Sapa