Rwanda National Police

The Rwanda National Police (RNP) on Wednesday released the latest report in its campaign against corruption in the force, in which 34 officers were arrested in various graft-related crimes.

ACP Damas Gatare, the Commissioner for Public Relations and Community Policing said those arrested include six junior officers while others are Non-Commissioned Officers (NCOs) and Police Constables (PC).

They were arrested between May and September this year. They received bribes ranging from Rwf1000 to Rwf1 million.

He said some of the officers took bribes to give out driving licences, alter traffic fine receipts given to traffic offenders and to include their colleagues on the list of those going for peacekeeping missions.

Others received bribes from drug dealers to facilitate them in their illegal businesses, he added.

31 of the arrested officers have so far been sentenced to different terms by the Police Disciplinary Committee.

He explained that 27 of the officers will be discharged from the force while four others will serve their sentence and be reintegrated back in the force.

“Corruption is zero-tolerance in Rwanda National Police and this should be a warning to even other officers that could be involved in such tendencies,” ACP Gatare said.

“We thank the public for their continued partnership to fight crimes, including corruption. We were able to apprehend these officers because of the credible information given to us by the public,” he added.

Files of civilian accomplices, he said, were forwarded to prosecution.