Source: Biometric system for firearm owners – herald
Nyore Madzianike-Senior Reporter
THE Zimbabwe Republic Police is engaging regional law enforcement agencies to establish an integrated biometric system to trace firearm owners across borders.
Police Deputy Commissioner-General Learn Ncube said authorities were working on a system under which all weapons would be fingerprinted among regional member states.
He said the system would enable countries to communicate swiftly when violations are detected.
Deputy Commissioner-General Ncube said this while giving oral evidence before the Joint Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Defence, Home Affairs, Security Services and War Veterans Affairs at the New Parliament Building in Mt Hampden on a petition regarding private firearms ownership, licensing, registration and enforcement in Zimbabwe.
“We are currently coming up with a system where all weapons are fingerprinted, but the approach is that if the licence is about to expire and the order is to bring in the weapon for renewal of the licence, the person is asked to bring in three live rounds.
“Those are fired and are fingerprinted, and we keep the information, and that process is built up to the national database.
“We are talking with the region to say, we want a system which would be able to communicate with the neighbours.”
Deputy Commissioner-General Ncube appealed to the committee for assistance in facilitating the procurement of the system.
“So, we ask for assistance really from this August House, from the committee, to assist us in pushing so that we are enabled to procure this system and we know if we manage to do that, everything else will be easier,” he said.
Ministry of Home Affairs and Cultural Heritage Permanent Secretary Ambassador Raphael Tayerera Faranisi told the committee that Zimbabwe has been observing the Africa Amnesty Act since 2022 in line with Article 12 of the Standard Protocol on Control of Firearms, Ammunition and Related Materials.
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