The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | More than 30,000 guns have so far been fingerprinted within Kampala Metropolitan Police – KMP, Katonga, Greater Masaka and Rwizi regions.
This is according to Obiga Kania, the Minister of State for Internal Affairs. He made the revelation during the manifesto Implementation Week by the ruling National Resistance Movement –NRM, at the Office of the Prime Minister.
The fingerprinting process started on 18th September 2018 with a view of creating a Forensic Database for all firearms using the Integrated Ballistic and Identification System – IBIS.
The nation-wide on-going exercise has according to Kania fingerprinted 29,916 guns from Uganda Police Force, 1,204 from the Uganda Prisons Services, 911 from Private Security Organisation and 149 guns that individual privately licensed.
According to Kania, a total of 5,840 firearms cartridge cases and bullets have been captured into the IBIS data base.
The Ministry of Internal Affairs estimates that over 400, 000 guns are in various hands across the country which is all subjected to verification and finger-printing.
According to Obiga, the gun fingerprinting exercise is expected to be concluded by end of this year or by mid-next year.
“Fingerprinting a gun means every gun has a peculiarity when it fires a bullet. When that bullet goes out, it leaves a certain figure print just like a human fingerprint is different,” Minister Obiga Kania says.
Adding that; “So If we know a fingerprint characteristic of every gun that should be able to help the police in tracing the guns which have been used for committing crime. And in this respect, we estimate 400,000 guns which we intend to fingerprint.”
Last year, President Yoweri Museveni ordered that all guns in Uganda be fingerprinted as part of a nine-point security master plan to address increasing killings and kidnaps in the country.
This was after the gruesome murder of former Buyende District Police Commander Muhammad Kirumira at Bulenga near his home.
The assassination of Kirumira was executed under familiar circumstances as the June 8, 2018 murder of former Arua Municipality MP Ibrahim Abiriga and his brother, the March 17, 2017 killing of Assistant Inspector General of Police (AIGP) Andrew Felix Kaweesi and that of Maj Muhammad Kiggundu among others.
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