Security: Army starts training 250 crime preventers at Kyankwanzi

Parade. President Museveni inspects a parade mounted by crime preventers at Kabalye Police Training School in Masindi District on September 3, 2014. FILE PHOTO

What you need to know:

  • Brig Karemire reaffirmed the source’s information, saying the leaders will help army scrutinise the group because they would not want to associate with the group whose history was not well documented.
  • Like Bodaboda 2010, crime preventers often said their main role was to protect President Museveni and vowed to encounter anyone who would attempt to muddle his leadership.

Kampala. Uganda People’s Defence Force (UPDF) has started training crime preventers’ coordinators at National Leadership Institute, Kyankwanzi, as part of the reversion process from Uganda Police Force.
Army spokesperson Brig Richard Karemire said 258 coordinators have started a one-month training that will see the group which the former Inspector General of Police, Gen Kale Kayihura, said was 11 million fully reverted into UPDF as a reserve force.

“You should actually call them former crime preventers because they are part of reserve force of UPDF. We have started with coordinators who will go through one-month training,” Brig Karemire said.

Reserve force
A week after Gen Kayihura was sacked and replaced with his deputy Martins Okoth-Ochola, President Museveni said crime preventers had been reverted to UPDF as a reserve force.
A source intimated to Daily Monitor that the 258 crime preventers undergoing training include district, regional and national coordinators.

“Each district has a coordinator. We also have regional and national coordinators. These coordinators are being trained so that they can help UPDF to choose the best and disciplined crime preventers who will be incorporated into a fully-fledged reserve force,” a source said.
Brig Karemire reaffirmed the source’s information, saying the leaders will help army scrutinise the group because they would not want to associate with the group whose history was not well documented.

“These are the coordinators and they are part of the mobilisation towards knowing who they are, we want to have them fully documented and properly categorised before we have them as a reserve force,” Brig Karemire said.
He added that the training will focus on, among other things, transformational ideologies as well as being non-sectarian in their duties.
“We shall train them on patriotism, Pan-Africanism and areas of social economic transformation. They will afterward bring others on board after a thorough screening,” Brig Karemire said.