An initiative of the National Academy of Public Administration, and the Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs and the Bobst Center for Peace and Justice, Princeton University Oral History Program Series: Policing Interview no.: T7 Interviewee: Sifuni Ernest Mchome Interviewer: Daniel Scher Date of Interview: 12 August 2009 Location: Dar es Salaam Tanzania Innovations for Successful Societies, Bobst Center for Peace and Justice Princeton University, 83 Prospect Avenue, Princeton, New Jersey, 08544, USA www.princeton.edu/successfulsocietes SCHER: My name is Daniel Scher, I'm the Associate Director of the Innovations for Successful Societies project, and I'm here with Professor Mchome at the University of Dar Es Salaam in Tanzania. Sir, thank you very much for taking time out of your very hectic schedule to meet with me. I really appreciate it and looking forward to hearing a little bit more about your involvement with the developments of the Tanzania Police Reform Program. And Sir, before we begin, I wonder if you could just tell us a little bit about yourself and your current position and how you got involved with the Tanzania Police Reform Program? MCHOME: Thank you Daniel. Indeed, I work with the University of Dar Es Salaam. I've been working with the University of Dar Es Salaam for some years now and basically, my employment with the University of Dar Es Salaam started in 1990. I was posted in the department of Civil and Criminal Law where we teach criminal law, criminal procedures and essentially all matters related to criminal justice I have been teaching criminal law for several years now as well as criminal procedure and, so, my area of specialization, essentially, is criminal justice. I basically got involved in the police activities rather early it was just merely two, three years after I had graduated from Queens University in Canada. I did my master's in law at Queens and my master's dissertation related to criminal justice. Though when I came back, there were a few issues related to policing and human rights and I was among the few people who were selected to provide the training in terms of human rights and policing in a democratic system. I participated in that program which was being run under the Legal Aid Committee of the Faculty of Law University of Dar Es Salaam. We used to go around the country, train police officers, and other officers, meaning prison officials as well as judicial officials. We completed that project which took us almost three years. SCHER: And when was this? MCHOME: That was 1993, 94, 95 and a bit of '96. We completed that particular component and then we continued to work with the police in specific areas. Sometimes they would request us to provide a particular training in a particular area. For example, how to deal with fraud cases or how to deal with cross-examinations because the police force also used to provide prosecutors as well. So we used to help police prosecutors, so we used to train them in some skills in terms of how they prosecute in court. But the prosecution work has now been taken over officially by the Office of the Director of Public Prosecutions so now it's a separate function run under a different entity. That's also a result of the reforms that we are currently undertaking. Thus, basically, I'm working with these institutions on a regular basis since those days up until now. We do quite a lot of things; that's why probably they think I can also speak for them in terms of a few things that have taken place as a result of reforms in Tanzania. SCHER: Sure, sure. Sir, in terms of the most current program of reforms, which I understand is being conducted under the medium term strategic plan. What is your involvement with that and what has been your involvement in the sort of developments of this program? MCHOME: First of all the MTS (Medium Term Strategy) that they have is a result of the Legal Sector Reform Program which brings together a number of players who deal with legal issues including the police. Initially, the police was not part of the Legal Sector Reform Program when it began in the 90's. Then gradually the police became part of the Legal Sector Reform Program and therefore their medium term strategic plans started to reflect the reforms that were targeted by the Legal Sector Reform Program. But before that, the police had already earmarked a few areas, which needed reforms. One was the Police General Orders. Most of the police forces around the world are organized around Police General Orders. These are instructions, which tell every police officer this is the way you have to behave in a particular situation among other things. That's the ground-norm we could say; that is the basic document for the police. Now, that document was formulated several years back; basically, it's a colonial heritage, it was inherited from the colonial police system and in the 90's the police realized that a lot of things have already changed and the document was no longer serving a very useful purpose. However, when they wanted to take certain action(s) in a particular area they realized that the document wouldn't really provide them with anything useful as it was outdated and did not contemplate the envisaged action(s). And so the first assignment which the Inspector General then thought should have been undertaken was to review that document so that at least it's in-line with the current development. But, traditionally, police officers are usually conservative in their practice; so it meant some of them really didn't like the idea of reviewing a document that they had become used to and they thought it's a document that really helped them in doing things. But, I think the top-most management thought, no, no, that cannot be the situation. So they started to look around for people who could provide some assistance in that regard; and they came to me and I agreed to do the job. I remember one of the officers came to me and told me categorically that "you will not succeed in this document; it has been here for years and many people have tried to change it and they've failed". I said: "well I'm not a defeatist; I don't believe in defeats, I believe in succeeding in whatever enterprise that I engage myself in. So let's try and then see exactly what will happen down the line". I took that job with a colleague of mine who also teaches here, he is also teaching in this department. The first thing we did was, basically, to look at the entire document and we realized that, actually, it's not a question of amending, it's a question of rewriting the whole document. Because so many things had changed, you'd find some provisions still relevant but the rest of the provisions are probably not relevant, so it was about rewriting. We thought it would take one year but then it ended up taking three years because the bulk of the things we had to do involved, actually, going and sitting, and talking to the people who actually do the police job on a regular basis. So, three years down the line we were able to come up with a new Police General Orders document and it was to the surprise of many. The document now reflects most of the issues that relate to democratic policing, which some people thought would be an impossible task to put in a document. But we thought, well, you can learn from colleagues, you can learn from other places, best of practices among other things; sometimes you don't need to reinvent the wheel, it's just about learning from others and seeing what they have done. So, we were able to do that and we think that document is a very good document in all assessments in terms of the region that we live in. In Kenya, Uganda, Rwanda, and Burundi, I don't think they have such a document. So, it's quite a step ahead, quite a step ahead and we thought there would be a lot of complaints from the practitioners because now the police will have to practice what is contained in the document but we were also surprised that there were no complaints that actually came back to us except a few areas which they said: "this one you would have improved a bit better". Now, we think that's positive than when they would tell you that: "now it's making our work very difficult" - you see that would have been a different issue but nobody's saying the document is making their work difficult except they think there are certain areas which would have provided more instructions in order to improve performance. SCHER: Even more? MCHOME: Even more. SCHER: Yes. MCHOME: So, at least they think that would have been a better thing. We have identified those areas and we realize that now we have to deal with new challenges, which were not there before. Cyber crime is becoming a challenging area, for example, and it's not addressed in the Police General Orders, we have terrorism; it is also not addressed; we have also trafficking issues which are also not addressed. But we realized that around that time it wouldn't have been possible to address such issues because we were still in the learning curve and so you wouldn't really know exactly what direction to take. SCHER: Sorry what time period was this, the three years that you were working on the PGOs? MCHOME: That was 2000, 2001, 2002, well we could say up to 2005 when we submitted the final document. SCHER: Ok I see. MCHOME: Yes. SCHER: I wonder and I'm sure you must have a wealth of examples, but I wonder if you could just tell me a little bit about perhaps one example from the old General Orders that just was no longer applicable in the context? MCHOME: For example, the previous orders did not have any operative principles; there were no principles exactly how policing is done. We thought that was a misnomer because, you know, policing has to be informed by certain philosophy and certain understanding. So, we realized the absence of that makes the police officer think that he is the decider; so, he could come up with his own ideas about how policing is done and that was a problem. I think most police institutions around the world, at least, they start nowadays with at least the basic principles that would apply and then the rest would flow from the principles. But then, the second was how do you affect an arrest, for example, in a real situation. While the laws outside had already developed to the extent of saying exactly how you can affect an arrest - arrest with warrant, arrest without warrant - all those situations were already predetermined by the law. The Police General Orders, basically, were silent about these kinds of issues. So, some of the arrests ended up becoming arbitrary in which case then when you asked a police officer he'd say but I've followed the Police General Orders, there is nowhere in the Police General Orders that prohibits this kind of behavior. Or in some situations you'd have, you'd have a provision, which actually tells a police officer that this is the way you are supposed to do-to conduct a particular operation. But if you came outside the police force, the law had already changed and that area is no longer permissible by the law. For example, premises, search of premises. In the past, premises could just be searched at will but then the law had developed to that extent that no, no you cannot search premises at will because now we have a constitutional principle of privacy. So you cannot do that, ok so, so all these issues were somewhat missing in the orders. But the biggest issue was that in 1984 we decided to enact the Bill of Rights and the Police General Orders predated the Bill of Rights. So a lot of things were contrary to what the Bill of Rights would basically require. Also, in 1985, we enacted a new law, the Criminal Procedure Act, which was an improved document in terms of legal rights of individuals and the Police General Orders actually were before that Act was enacted. So a lot of things appeared contradictory. In general, the whole aspect of due process was an issue; so those are some of the areas, and you'd see that when you're writing Police General Orders most of the issues must confirm the rights of individuals at least first, but then second must enable operations, police operations that's the second. That while you have the rights of individuals then you must enable also police operations, so there must be a balance; and that balance is always a very delicate balance; these are two regimes, which don't fit very easily to each other. But you have to do that. So those are basically the kind of issues that we dealt with. And as a result then, you realize the whole document had to be rewritten. SCHER: Right, right, so I mean you mentioned that police officers are conservative and that there's this delicate balance between confirming the rights of individuals and enabling officers to do their job. And so in what way was this new document sort of sold to the police officers. How were they, I guess got on board with this new way of doing things? MCHOME: What we did, we first of all organized what we call working sessions. These working sessions targeted specializations in the police force; if for example you're dealing with riots we have a unit which is disaster management unit for example, which is part of the police. Basically it deals with riots, essentially it's about riots. Now if you want to deal with that particular aspect, we organized working sessions with the individuals that manage that particular unit. And so we thought this is all about change management, how do you really make these people become your agent of change. And so we, me and my colleague took the approach that they should first identify the weaknesses themselves. If they could tell us, exactly what are the hindrances and what are the good things that they think the document actually gives them on a daily basis when they are doing their operational work. And we realized that they would never refer to the document. So you come to the conclusion that in fact the document is a dead document as far as they are concerned. That they have their own other ways of dealing with this particular problem, which would mean then that the document needs to be changed. Then how do we change it? So we'll come with our ideas that ok suppose we went in this direction what do you think would be the benefits and impediments to your work; and usually you realize that they'll usually start saying but now we are used to this and your job now is to tell them ok yes that's because of the convenience it gives you. But what if we did this, don't you think it will make your job even easier. The discussion will go on and on until issues are resolved. Now through those working sessions we had positive results - we came to a lot of agreements and I'm one of those people who also believe, don't force changes. Just make things flow the way they should especially when it comes to operational matters. So we realized that certain things would be very difficult to change because people have already become accustomed to such behavior and therefore it would be difficult. But my measure was always that if I can afford to enlist at least about 80% of the changes then the 20% I can afford to let it remain because then I know that it should be very easy to change the 20% when you have started to roll out the document because then they will discover the benefit of what you are telling them and thus be able to accept the remaining changes that you are proposing. And that is what we did, that we worked towards a certain target; that certain things would be achieved and once we have succeeded around those things then we just let the other things proceed the natural way along the reform path. SCHER: I see, so you identified the key things that you wanted- MCHOME: The key things. SCHER: That you wanted implemented and- MCHOME: Exactly, exactly. SCHER: And then a compromise on- MCHOME: On certain issues. SCHER: On certain issues? I see, I see. MCHOME: Exactly. So we had working sessions but we also had workshops; we organized a series of workshops, a series of workshops with all the players, all from the rank and file all the way to the other top positions. But the third method, which we used, was to address the commanders themselves; they have what they call the annual meeting of commanders and half-annual meetings of commanders. These commanders are regional police commanders and you have also the commanders of certain units, you have a number of units; there are so many of them. So during those meetings you basically tell them this is what it is that you're supposed to do in this area. And then you will generate a lot of discussion around that area and so you know their feelings. You can measure now their feelings and therefore you know exactly what kind of interventions would need to be made in a particular area. And in that way we were able to look at a lot of things but the good thing was the Inspector General himself because he would say, no, no; now my colleagues I think we have to change, the world is changing because he'd traveled a lot and he would see what other people do. So he was also a very good instrument, if I could use that term, in terms of change. SCHER: But was this former IG (Inspector General)? MCHOME: Former. SCHER: Ok. MCHOME: The current IGP (Inspector General of Police) came when the orders were already in place and they were rolling. SCHER: Already in place? MCHOME: Exactly. So we used quite a few interventions and I think they all, they all proved to be very useful, in terms of achieving the changes that we really wanted. Yes, so once we'd completed the Police General Orders of course there were other issues to address. Now you talk of other issues because the 20% that I talked about probably had a lot of other explanations as to why it was impossible to change and these related to systems that you have in place, some related to the laws that you have in place, some also related to operational difficulties that you encounter. Dar Es Salaam, you have been in Dar Es Salaam now I don't know for how long, but you could see the way Dar Es Salaam is built. Dar Es Salaam is not a very well organized city and that tells you of all other cities in Tanzania. Police use patrol system, they use a beat system, you may have several beats in different areas. Now these patrols envisage a certain order in the way the city is organized. Beats also envisage a certain order in the way the city is organized. So if you were to deal with that system in terms of change then you will have to change the organization of the towns and cities, which is almost an impossible enterprise. So you realize that if you tell police officers, no, no, no, you should organize your beats. Why do you have ten beats, why don't you have 20 beats? But where? Where do you place them? And then you will need a lot of tools and other things that then make the whole exercise impossible. Patrolling a city like Dar Es Salaam using Land Rovers or on foot for example instead of bicycles or motorbikes or horses is a challenge. SCHER: This is part two of the interview, we were just talking about beats and how you arrange beats in a very- MCHOME: Chaotic. SCHER: Chaotic, yes. MCHOME: Chaotic design of the city. So you'd have, you'd have problems, logistical problems in terms of, in terms of reforms because then you'll be talking about not reforming the police but reforming the way you conceive towns, cities and organize them, which then make it not part of the police itself but part of a larger, a larger problem that has to be addressed by many people. So, so and then you have laws, laws which probably offer limited explanation to certain things. For example if you said a person should be arrested and once a person is arrested, should be taken to the police station then to the court as soon as possible and then there is no measure on how soon is soon!. So if you tell a police officer that, no, that should be within one hour, two hours or three hours then you have other limitations in remote areas where they think and say, no, no; it can't be possible because the nearest court is ten miles away. SCHER: I see. MCHOME: Ok, that's the nearest court then it can't be the measure of how soon is soon really. It has to be relative, it has to be relative it can't be fixed; you can't have a very objective way of determining exactly how it is going to be operationalized in each area. So you're ambiguous; you can use some laws that say "without undue delay". What is it that is undue in terms of delays? Again, when you look at the geography and the other things you realize that can only be measured in a very subjective way, there is no way you can be objective. So those also make it difficult to really gauge exactly how a police officer should behave in a particular situation. And also, you have laws, which will give a particular power to an individual, ok, but then it wouldn't really say much in terms of how that particular power is exercised. So if you decided to do that in the Police General Orders then the police again feel like you are just trying to constrain them because the law doesn't really say that. The law has given them this unlimited kind of terrain to operate and if you constrain them then you must have a lot of discussion and really convince them that it's only unfortunate that the law did not go to the extent of prescribing exactly how that particular power should be discharged or that particular function should be discharged. But now you as individual being you need to have your own system of how you discharge that particular function and realize the powers that you have been accorded with. But then we have systems; the systems themselves don't talk to each other in some cases; they were not configured to do so; they were not designed to talk to each other. You realize you have the police force, you have the prisons, you have the courts, you have everybody that you think is important in the law enforcement business. They're there but then how do you, indeed how does each of these entities enable the work of another. For example, if today we talk of intelligence-led policing how do you gather, how do you utilize the available intelligence for police function. It means that the two systems must be able to talk to each other, now if you don't have a mechanism of making them talk to each other then you can't just reform the police and tell them it has to be intelligence led because then it won't work in real terms. So those again are all matters of system. But also we realized in terms of the institution itself because it's one thing to give it the orders but then it's another thing to have an institution that can work along those orders. The police is not all that endowed in terms of facilities and by the time we were doing the reforms it really had quite a lot of problems in terms of facilities. It was also not well endowed in terms of personnel, which means then its geographical coverage would also be a problem, so it was not covering, you know, it was not evenly distributed. And when we use the concept of evenly distributed of course in the police science sometimes some people don't understand it. We're not saying that you cover the whole country the same way but you cover the whole country in terms of policing activities. So each area will have its own policing needs. So the concept of evenly distribution is not like in water in a jar that the jar is covered evenly, no, no. It's, it's that you have these services available as and when they are needed, ok, that's the concept. Now if the police force is not endowed in terms of resources - financial, logistical, human, it's not that endowed - then you'll have a problem. In which case then you'll get the first problem, and that is selective policing, ok, selective policing. Now certain areas will receive more priorities than certain areas and once you have that kind of a situation of course you will have complaints. People will complain that, you know there were robbers yesterday night and there was no police service that was available to us and they hear in Dar Es Salaam, last night there was also a robbery incident and the police responded immediately. Then they wonder what is it that is going on in this area. But then the problem is resources. So once that was realized, the police force -and again I was involved in this process, decided to embark on a modernization drive. Modernization in terms of really empowering it, giving it the tools that it needs. First of all identifying the gaps-so we carried out kind of a SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) analysis to identify all the gaps that exist and then work towards modernizing the force. Then we identified that resources, several resources will be needed. But when it came to, some can be acquired through money, just invest some money and then you get that. But some need investment like personnel. You really need to invest in terms of their training, in terms of their selection, in terms of their continued education among other things. So some can be resolved easily while others, others would need a very long-term kind of strategic plan. But then we realized that the modernization drive has to address both the existing and those who will be recruited. The existing personnel and those who will be recruited. You can't just say now we're modernizing, we're buying new equipment. But these people have never used such equipment, they do not know how to use some of it, they don't even understand why they should use those kind of things. Some are used to arresting first and then investigating later, and then you're telling them today, no, no you investigate first and then you arrest. So they don't understand, so you still need to invest in these people who already exist. For those who you'll be recruiting, it's not a problem because you will be training them around those new tenets but you still have people who are employed. So we realized that while you recruit and train, you still need to retrain the individuals that are already in place. But then we discovered also that the police are becoming overwhelmed by the new challenges in that crime is becoming sophisticated. Crime is becoming a science; the traditional way of committing crimes probably have just remained in just a few areas. Stealing today is done in a very organized way, even murders. People murder and conceal, they work against anything that will make them caught by the law enforcement system. So even the murderers of today are not like those of yesterday. And so crime has changed and the challenge is not really to address the conventional crimes that were being committed decades ago, it's to address the modern ways of committing crime. So it's like the police instead of being a preventive tool, it's a reactive tool. So you no longer prevent, you no longer detect, you are reacting to incidents and when you have fewer police officers then it means that will be your daily job and then you forget about the other functions of the police force which is prevention, detection among other things. So once we realized that we thought of retooling and this is not purely training because probably there isn't much you can achieve through training but try to retool them, give them new techniques, give them exposure to other systems which have already, already responded to such problems, bringing in a few experts from outside to come and share ideas on how you deal with the new challenges and new situations. So again, all these are kinds of issues that are taking place. You realize eventually that the system is responding but then the results, the actual results will take time. But as you change the system you realize that criminals also change their tactics. I think you were here last week or two weeks before. You were in Dar Es Salaam? When did you come? SCHER: Actually only on the weekend, only on Saturday night. MCHOME: Ok, if you were here two weeks ago then you would have realized that even robbers have discovered that you don't sometime need to go to a bank with a machine gun you can actually take a hand grenade- SCHER: I read about that. MCHOME: Yes, yes and use the hand grenade to cause havoc, steal and go away. Now you realize these are challenges not so much because that's the way the society is but because now the society has to face other new realities, ok, it has to face other new realities. Realities caused by migration, realities caused by the wars that we have around us in those places where they're still fighting, realities caused by the mayhem and chaos in Somalia. You know, these are the things that you have to contend and deal with. Somalia is just a few miles away from Dar Es Salaam and people come in boats and ships and everything. If you don't have an effective system of controlling those issues it means the loose hand grenades in Somalia and all those places find their way into a city like Dar Es Salaam. Now and that's why we talk of intelligence led policing now. But then you must have a system that is properly configured to really be able to respond to these new challenges. And the challenges are many. They aren't just about the banks, they're also about safety on roads, in our own houses, and in the way we deal with information and transmitting information; there are many challenges. We talk about ATM (Automated Teller Machine) theft, is a new problem in Dar Es Salaam, in Tanzania, but it's not a new problem in other places in the world. SCHER: ATM? MCHOME: ATM, yes; the ATM problem in the banks and so you have experts, people who know how to use fake cards and other things to steal from banks; these are new things which, so as you keep on reforming you have to really address the new challenges which come up. Yes. SCHER: Very challenging... MCHOME: Quite an interesting area, yes, quite an interesting area. SCHER: I had a couple of questions, I just wanted to ask, you mentioned, I don't want to say inadequacy of some of the laws but the way in which they don't encompass the full range of situations that police officers encounter and are there any effects or attempts being made to reform the laws themselves or is it being dealt with through the new General Orders? MCHOME: No, there are attempts to reform the laws themselves under or through the Law Reform Commission, and so if a law has been identified as a problem, it's normally addressed. Yes it's normally addressed but then the way you change laws take time and like the General Orders which you resolve the matter with the police then the laws have to, you have to deal with a whole range of stakeholders that are involved up to the Parliament. So attempts are there, attempts are there. They may have taken time but they are there. And for example, the immediate challenge was in relation to, how do you address domestic violence, for example. Do you address that in the Police General Orders and then the laws themselves are not properly organized? So they discovered that the best way is to really address the laws first and then deal with the Police General Orders later. SCHER: I see, I see and you mentioned one of the things that you were able to see that the system was responsive but that the results take some time and so one of the things I was wondering is how you're able to measure the effect of the changes that you have been instrumental in implementing? Particularly say the General Orders, how are you able to gauge that that people are actually following them. Are there monitoring mechanisms or any evaluation systems? MCHOME: Yes. Among the changes that we installed and we think that is good, is establishment of an office that will carryout monitoring of police work; and this is an independent system outside the police force itself. We thought that the police service has it's own way of monitoring its own activities yes, but the lawyers say no man should be a judge of his own course so there was a directorate that was established to do the monitoring and manage complaints. And so the type of complaints which are received nowadays are different, are largely different from those which were being received before, before the General Orders were changed and that's one way that we use to measure success. But the second is to look at the nature of complaints, the nature of complaints received which were, were being received before the orders were made related to arbitrary treatment, torture and all those kinds of things and we realized that it's because the law, the orders themselves were not very clear on those kinds of issues. So you realize that even the police officers now they know, before a complaint is received you may have been dealt with by your own superior because then you have done something contrary to the orders. But before then there was little reference to such issues. So you realized that the nature of complaints received nowadays are not so much on those issues, they could be somewhere around issues probably of bribery or some police officers not taking action immediately or things which are bad but they're not as bad as when you compare to the situation that used to exist. SCHER: And related perhaps to specific officers rather than institutional problems? MCHOME: Correct, correct, now, now related to very specific individuals than when you relate the issue to the whole institution, yes. Now these are specific issues rather than the general and we think, we think also the reforms have led to separation of powers in certain areas. For example prosecution, so the police will not prosecute. They will send these matters to the prosecutors who are under the National Prosecution Service. The police would not escort prisoners to remand and other places, which will be done by the prison service, and therefore the room for abuse has been minimized, the room for abuse has been minimized. It takes a courageous officer to abuse a person nowadays; it's not all that easy. Because exposure will become very easy. Now that has also helped in identifying the weaker spots, now you can tell easily these are the weaker spots and then you can address them. SCHER: I see, I see, just under the directorate that does the monitoring and complaints collection, where is it housed? MCHOME: In the Ministry of Home Affairs. SCHER: Ok so, ok so- MCHOME: Ministry of Home Affairs. SCHER: Ok. And it was established...? MCHOME: Three years, three years back. SCHER: Ok. MCHOME: Three, four years back now. SCHER: Ok. MCHOME: So it's still new but it's good, it's there and it's starting to put itself into the picture. SCHER: Right, right. That sounds like a very worthwhile system. Yes, I wanted to ask about the separation of powers particularly as it relates to the prosecuting. So this was previously handled by police prosecutors? MCHOME: Correct SCHER: And now it's being- MCHOME: Handled by State Attorneys. SCHER: State Attorneys, ok? MCHOME: Yes and the National Prosecution Service, which is independent and has been created as a constitutional office. SCHER: Ok so that's a completely new...? MCHOME: Completely new. SCHER: And- MCHOME: 2004 in terms of the idea but then the law and the system is 2008. SCHER: Ok, ok. MCHOME: About a year old. SCHER: Sure, so this, I mean this is really an incredibly wide ranging number of reforms and I was wondering in your-as somebody who has been involved since the early 90's in these types of reforms, it seems to me that at this stage it's-the reforms are much bigger and much less piece meal and aimed at more holistically reforming the system, and you mentioned the increase in crime as being one of the factors that sort of necessitated this. But I wonder if you could account for perhaps why it's happening now or why it started at least a few years ago, what was the point at which it became an absolute necessity to do a complete restructuring? MCHOME: I think if we go back in history, the idea to restructure the police force actually started in the 70's. SCHER: Ok. MCHOME: For some reason reports and recommendations were made and were never carried out. SCHER: Ok, sure. MCHOME: And around 1985 then some of the recommendations were carried out and these were largely the results of the enactment of the Bill of Rights. SCHER: Ok. MCHOME: And that's why 1985 there was no other option except to change the Criminal Procedure Act because apparently, people think or rather many people do not know exactly how abuses start. They basically start with the criminal procedure system that you have in place. If your criminal procedure system is silent on the way you handle criminal cases, the methods and the institutions and the other things you have, if they are not properly ordered, then you will always have all these problems. So in 1985 then some of the recommendations, which were made in the 70's, were carried out. For example, one of the recommendations that was carried out through the Criminal Procedure Act was to ensure that a search can only be done with a warrant, unless the offense is committed in the presence of the officer in question. SCHER: Presence of the? MCHOME: If a person commits a crime in the presence of a police officer. SCHER: Ok. MCHOME: Then you arrest then you can search the individual but if that's not the situation, you must have a warrant. So that was a good intervention because then you did away with this possibility of a police officer coming to knock at your door and saying now we want to search your office or your house or this. That was arbitrary. But then those were very limited interventions. So in the 90's again another study was done and this study came up with more or less the same recommendations like those that were made in the 70's. SCHER: 70's, ok. MCHOME: Yes, so this study confirmed that there is a problem. You really need to deal with these kinds of issues. But then in the 90's crime had really shot up and the public was complaining so much that there was no way you could just keep a blind eye to those kinds of issues; and the complaints ranged from abuse to inaction, to lack of skills, to a lot of things and so that's why I think the police force itself realized it's better it started from within SCHER: This is part three of the interview. MCHOME: We were talking about why, why now? SCHER: Yes, why now? MCHOME: I was saying that the public was complaining so much about almost everything: abuse, inaction, poor distribution of police officers and there are a lot of other things. So the police realized that ok, charity begins at home and why don't you start to look at your own house and then before someone tells you know it's not going to be like that forever. So that's why they started to look at their own systems. And then institutions like ours, the university, we also thought we can help in this regard by providing some training, by helping them in doing some studies. Our job is to research. So we researched and realized, ok, probably this is where you're doing it wrong. Why don't you do it this way, it will probably help. And so we came in also, but then we also realized that the government thought the police is supposed to really serve the people and if the police is becoming unpopular it means the government itself will become unpopular. So again other interventions came in through the Legal Sector Reform Program. Also, myself and I think my colleagues will also collaborate on these; there was more interaction between our police and the other police institutions outside Tanzania. SAPCO, this is South African police chiefs organization and other things came in also. We have the East African police chiefs organization. I think there are a lot of other initiatives from the AU (African Union) level and also initiatives from INTERPOL (International Criminal Police Organization), the global picture and also you realize now you come into the new problems that we are facing in terms of terrorism, in terms of cyber crimes, and others; so that has made the police community around the world kind of come together and through that process you also realize, you learn. You realize that we do this in Tanzania but our colleagues are doing it the other way and probably that is a more effective way of doing it. So there are all these factors that actually have helped to push the reform agenda a bit further than it used to be in the previous years. So, there are many reasons really. SCHER: Many reasons that just sort of coalesced at that point? MCHOME: Correct. SCHER: One of the things I have observed though is that there seems to have been a very high level of political support? MCHOME: Correct. SCHER: And political leadership and even a significant amount of involvement in various workshops and seminars? And I mean what is your opinion on how this has affected the process? MCHOME: That's one of the factors actually. The political will is so high, you see for example in 2005 the new President, the President, the current President appointed the Inspector General who is a learned person he has worked internationally, and he has a law degree, and he appointed people who have really good education to lead the police and I think you don't need anything much bigger than that, than that will, that let me get the right people to the various positions and then ask these people to help me in the change agenda and then once we have such people they can relate very easily with other people because they are also professionals; they have wider knowledge of issues. So you see these are kinds of interventions and the political will is unquestionable actually, it's unquestionable, at this point in time; it's unquestionable. SCHER: So going forward what do you see as the future challenges, or the future obstacles perhaps that the reform program may encounter? MCHOME: I think the biggest challenge is, will relate to the following issues: one, personnel improvement; you still need police officers, the police officers currently are few. You really need more of them and now that has to go into the public purse in terms of money, their salaries, their training and all those issues. So you'll keep on having this short fall but the key to many of the problems that we have is to get people into the police force and actually attract them to the police force. Because it's also about changing the attitude that the police force is for people who have not gone to school. I think make it as one of the places where people can be employed, ok. SCHER: Right. MCHOME: So that, that means you address the work environment, you address their salaries and all those kinds of issues, which of course the current IGP is addressing already but then it will take time. But the other thing, which I realized, is for many institutions to realize that the police can rarely be effective if these other institutions themselves are not effective. What I mean here, if our city planning continues to be the way it is, then we'll be asking too much from the police. Because it's making it impossible for them to operate, so if we keep on doing the kinds of things we do in terms bad designs in our cities, then we'll continue to have problems forever. So this is what I mean that other institutions must also realize that they're part of the policing process. This is not just for a mere statement; indeed if you disorganize your house and then you call the police to come and organize it and control crimes, you should know it won't work or it may just work in a very limited way. So other institutions should also realize that they are part of the policing process. The other thing, which I think is important, is to realize that the people themselves, that culture of helping the police, - of being the first responders -really has to grow. Unless that grows then it's very difficult to police in the modern way, in the modern days and the kinds of things we have. How do you make the person the first responder? Other countries have managed it, but in our situation, we still have a long way to go. That people are not yet there in terms of really being able to help the police, to be really the first line of action, in terms of crimes and other things related to law enforcement. And that again is a challenge, which I see as an issue that has to be addressed. And finally, I realize that we need to keep on investing in training because crime is not a static animal, it keeps on changing, and the techniques and the environment keep also changing. Technology is changing very fast, today probably you don't need a lot of physical or manual things. Probably technology enabled kind of policing might be a solutions to some of the, some of the problems and challenges that we have. So it's all those kinds of issues that I see as challenges for the future. We have them today but they'll keep on growing into the future. SCHER: I see, I see, excellent. So I don't want to take up any much more of your valuable time, I just perhaps want to give you an opportunity to reflect on anything that I haven't asked or perhaps anything that's particularly distinctive about this, this Tanzania Police Reform Program. Unless you feel, we've covered most of the key points? MCHOME: One thing that I should say is, the reform agenda is being driven whole-heartedly. Really, everybody is happy that these kinds of reforms are taking place. And I think that is key to change, if you want to enlist a positive change I think you have to have people with you; that people should feel that it's a good thing that is happening. Probably they don't know exactly which direction to go but at least accepting the idea itself is very good. Secondly, I just hope that the leadership will continue to be the way it is, I just hope that will continue to be the situation. These areas are very delicate and people change hearts very easily and I realize you have a new President and he thinks you guys are all doing the right things and think I want this direction and that's all. So you have all those kind of support; but I just hope that what we have started will be sustained into the future. I think those are the only things, which I should say at this point in time. I hope the results that are recorded will be sustained and even hit better results into the future. SCHER: Excellent, excellent, well on that note I think we will end here Sir. MCHOME: Thank you. SCHER: Thank you. Innovations for Successful Societies Series: Policing Oral History Program Interview Number: T-7 ________________________________________________________________________ 15 Use of this transcript is governed by ISS Terms of Use, available at www.princeton.edu/successfulsocieties Use of this transcript is governed by ISS Terms of Use, available at www.princeton.edu/successfulsocieties