Minister for Home Affairs Mathias Chikawe speaks to Journalists in Dar es Salaam yesterday. Mr Chikawe listed successes and accomplishments including curbing crime that his ministry has recorded during the ten years of the fourth government under President Jakaya Kikwete.
PHOTO|SALIM SHAO.
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The minister told journalists yesterday during a press conference that in the ten years of President Kikwete’s administration the ministry through its various departments had managed to secure the country and save it from internal and external threats.
Dar es Salaam. The minister for Home Affairs, Mr Mathias Chikawe, yesterday listed successes and accomplishments including curbing crime that his ministry has recorded during the ten years of the fourth government under President Jakaya Kikwete.
The minister told journalists yesterday during a press conference that in the ten years of President Kikwete’s administration the ministry through its various departments had managed to secure the country and save it from internal and external threats.
“The police force has managed to control crime, especially involving the use of arms that at some time started to grow at a high rate. This was during the early days of Kikwete’s administration,” he said.
He said there was a network of local and international criminals from neighbouring countries who were posing a great threat to the peace and security of the nation, saying the police had managed to break it.
He added that a special task force on armoury had managed to seize 6,693 weapons and 5,909 suspects had been arrested.
Mr Chikawe said his ministry trough the police had continued with its duty of enforcing the law and that crime had gone down to a large extent.
Asked on claims levelled against the police on human rights abuse, Mr Chikawe said the police were accountable to the people and those who accused them were not responsible to anyone.
“At the end of the day, the government will be answerable to its people but those who accuse them will end there and nobody will ask them,” he said.
He said during the ten years the ministry had recruited 11,842 police officers, 8,371 prison wardens, 1,820 immigration officers and 1341 fire and rescue officers. He said the ministry had managed to secure the country’s borders despite the Burundi crisis which has led to the flow of more refugees in the country.
