8th December 2009 (The Guardian)
Inspector General of Police, Saidi Mwema
The Police Force has opened an inquiry on individuals named in the controversial UN Security Councils Group of Experts report linking some individual Tanzanians in a racket of arms transfer to a rebel group in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).
This was revealed in Dar es Salaam yesterday by the Inspector General of Police, Saidi Mwema, when he met media editors and senior journalists as part of his routine work of sharing the 2009 experiences on the collaboration between police and the public in general.
We always conduct inquiries on any allegation that we hear. You have to note that we have two types of police inquiry, one is investigating and arrest and the second is arrest and investigate. So we have launched an inquiry into the matter, he said.
The IGP was apparently responding to a question on measures the force had taken regarding the UN Security Council report, which has touched some individuals and senior officials from the government, ruling party and the military.
Prior to the IGP response, the Director of Criminal Investigations, Robert Manumba said there was no evidence that the Tanzanian government had participated in the matter.
The government cannot go against the rights of its people and the people of Africa. Tanzania has been the base for the liberation of countries under colonial rule. It cannot do such a thing, the DCI insisted.
Manumba said the said arms were being carried by individuals just like the way arms from the DRC, Burundi and Rwanda were being proliferated and used by bandits to carry out criminal acts, including armed robberies in the country.
You cannot say it was DRC, Rwanda or Burundi governments that had brought the illegal arms into our country. It is just that the arms had slipped into unsafe hands and consequently were smuggled into our country by individuals, he said. It is therefore only few individual criminals who might be carrying the business and not the government, the DCI added.
On November 29, this year, the government through its Foreign Affairs and International Co-operation minister Bernard Membe demanded UN apology over allegations that Tanzania was among 25 countries illegally supplying arms to a Hutu rebel group in the DRC.
Membe termed the accusations contained in a controversial UN report as a concoction with evil intentions, adding that it was malicious, not acceptable and must be ignored.
However, the UNs Group of Experts report was detailing how some individuals in Tanzania have been trafficking arms to FDLR rebels.
The Group established that the FDLR received significant deliveries of weapons and ammunition in 2009 from outside the DRC, in particular equipment that has been smuggled into South Kivu across Lake Tanganyika from Tanzania.
According to the report, the Group had corroborated such information through several interviews with FDLR ex-combatants who personally witnessed such arms transfers, and from the Groups analysis of phone records of an individual who is in communication with both the FDLR and Tanzanian officials who the Group has confirmed as being part of an arms trafficking network.
The report mentions Bande Ndangundi, a Congolese resident of Dar es Salaam who has been spending long periods of time in Burundi in 2009, has coordinated the delivery of military equipment to the FDLR.
According to the report several sources, including a source close to Ndagundi, had disclosed that the Congolese had close links with the ruling CNDD-FDD party in Burundi as well as senior officials in the Tanzanian government, police and military.
These allegations appear to be corroborated by the fact that Ndagundis phone records show frequent communications between himself and support staff of senior Tanzanian ruling party officials, as well as a senior officer in the Tanzanian military, it says.
The report adds: The Group continues to investigate these individuals. Ndagundis Burundian phone records also show 27 communications from April to September 2009 between himself and the number used by Francis Mndolwa, the Tanzanian ambassador to Burundi, a former general in the Tanzanian military. A source close to Ndagundi informed the Group that he works closely with the ambassador.
The reports has mentioned some ex-combatants, as well as several other sources saying that the coordination of weapons and ammunition deliveries from Lake Tanganyika was supervised by Lt Col Félicien Nsanzubukire (alias Fred Irakeza) and Major Mazuru (who is in contact with Col Nakabaka of the FARDC), both FDLR officers based in the Sange area of Uvira.
Others mentioned in the report are the FDLR Deputy Commander, Major General Stanislas Nzeyimana (alias Bigaruka) and others.
SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN