via Chihuri transfers corrupt officers to remote areas | SW Radio Africa by Mthulisi Mathuthu on Monday, April 28, 2014
Police commissioner general Augustine Chihuri has transferred about 1,000 officers, in a major shake-up aimed at minimizing corruption within the force.
According to a police internal communiqué, the transfers have been approved and are with immediate effect. A report in the Standard newspaper said the move saw junior and senior officers from the minerals unit moved from urban to remote areas and vice versa around the country.
The shake-up follows allegations that some senior officers were working hand in glove with criminal rings in the gold and diamond mining sector. Last month the head of the mineral unit, assistant commissioner Silence Pondo, told Parliament that the police were not obliged to hand over gold recovered from criminal scenes. It is suspected that police officers are taking advantage of the loophole to enrich themselves by selling the recovered minerals in the informal sector.
But observers see the move to transfer officers as an ineffective way to stamp out corruption within the police force. Questions are being asked why the corrupt officers have not been fired and brought before the courts.
The Combined Harare Residents Association spokesman Simbarashe Moyo said ‘Chihuri’s latest move is just a joke.’ Moyo said the affected officers will simply be inconvenienced but not deterred from indulging in corruption. He said: ‘Corruption within the police force has reached levels where it cannot be properly dealt with by the government.’ He said it was an ‘open secret’ in the country that corruption is ‘a way of life’ for most police officers.
Moyo added: ‘Corruption has become so rampant that the police now punish those who resist it. For example, if you own a commuter omnibus and you don’t bribe the police officers they will punish you severely and you will never make any profit.’
A few years ago the Anti-corruption Trust of Southern Africa found that Zimbabwean traffic cops were the most corrupt in the region. Last year Afrobarometer, a research project which measures public attitudes on socio-economic issues, found that Zimbabwe was the third most corrupt African country after joint leaders Nigeria and Egypt.
Reports of police recklessness have also increased of late. According to the Crisis in Zimbabwe Coalition traffic cops have caused three deaths this year in separate incidents during police chases in Harare. In 2013 one person died, while an elderly woman was knocked down. That’s same year 16 people were injured when a commuter omnibus overturned in Bulawayo under similar circumstances.
COMMENTS
Don’t be fooled ,this is just rotation so the others can also benefit from the looting.
Shame on you Chihuri.
Your term of office expired long back and your friends Mugabe and Tsvangirai illegally extended it.
GGGOOOOOOO.
Transferring achieves one thing. Widespread Corruption!
A thief should go to jail. A Corrupt person should go to jail. This is Zanu’s Modus Operandi.No one goes to jail. It is also to divide and rule. Any of my brothers that can show me a good Politician I will remove my hat and salute you. What we thrive for in this kind of situation is the better option. If any of us are looking for Mr perfect you will wait a long time. That better the Devil you know does not wash. Get rid of the Devil you know.
Exactly! No one here is held accountable. Chihuri should know better.
The whole Police Force is very corrupt to an extent that not even a single citizen enjoys their service. The only way to deal with these corrupt members is to put them before a firing squad, discard corrupt bodies in disused mines and create a new Police Service and not a POLICE FORCE.
dumbest idiot chihuri so you think we ftrm binga deserve your excrements.. take mugabe to chikurubi first if you are serious about crime
Roving Ambassador your hatred for Tsvangirai goes beyond any human imagination. What role does Tsvangirai have in the extenstion of Chihuri’s terms. One only hope that there is an element of ignorance and you can be forgiven
Have you forgotten they had an agreement to extend Chihuri’s term.[bob and Tsvangirai]
The truth shall set us free.
As long as there is money to be found in the pockets of people in their new areas, they will continue to extort it out of them. If they could force it out of the relatively more sophisticated townsfolk what chance do the rural folk stand against them? Not a solution at all.
And who said there was no corruption already in those areas. They are being rewarded for their evil by their evil masters.
Transferring, rather than disciplining and prosecuting, corrupt police officers is a politically expedient move that will be of dubious efficacy. What was not done speaks louder to me. General Chihuri has been top cop for a long time and I would expect a man of integrity to take leadership responsibility for allowing this level corruption to develop in the Zimbabwe Republic Police. I feel sorry for those members of the force, that have integrity, and yet have to work in such a morally pestilential workplace.
When is a person fired nai veduwee. Corruption inopera nekuenda kunoshandira kumusha here
Its like someone trying to dust his room by using a blower. You will only remove the dust from where you can see it, but it will just settle somewhere in the house, even on your head! Sweep all the trash out and dispose in the dust bin. This is where the corrupt officers belong.
Nobody can be held accountable because all are guilty. The first one to go down will take the house of cards with him.
So we have this shuffling, never-ending mess, the only constant is the downtrodden and abused citizenry.
Motor mouth Themba MLiswa said it loud and clear that Chihuri is the most corrupt person in Zimbabwe that’s why he can’t do anything about crooked cops!
It was interesting listening to an innocent and frazzled tourist getting off a commuter mini bus yesterday. A two hour journey took 3.5 hours. Why? 5 Police Road Blocks. Fined for a range of strangely irrelevant things, the tourists expressed total amazement that not one police officer commented on the 25 passengers squeezed rigid in a 12 seater mini bus.
Then when a collection went round to pay the fribes our innocent tourists understood the benefit of 25 passengers…. ZIMBABWE POLICE AT WORK!
Remote areas? I really dont know what this means in the context of Zimbabwe. The whole country is remote – its a remote area!
Typical ZanuPF. Kneejerk reaction to every problem.No wonder the problems are 34years old and still growing.This one may yet backfire.Imagine these “rogues” upsetting the party “strongholds”!!. With Economic paralysis beckoning,these rotten eggs could be the catalyst for a backlash from the long sufferring party cadres.
This is the force and is the truth was experienced by a friend at a roadblock were forced to pay some money when the police argued that the licence on the vehicle was expired when in fact it was not expired but because they just wanted money so the person demanded a name from him and he refused to give it and allowed them to proceed . this type of scenario has also been experienced by visitors so the message of corrupt police force will go out and everyone willknow
The only place remote enough for a corrupt Policeman is jail. Chihuru and co cannot prosecute these people because they are corrupt themselves. He the tells them “Guys I will have to let you lie low until the dust settles.” What a load of nonsense. You are supposed to fire corrupt people so that you set an example and create jobs for those that would choose to be honest.