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Bongani Ndlovu, Online Reporter

THIS year’s edition of the Zimbabwe International Trade Fair’s end (ZITF) was not marred by incidents of vuzu parties, rowdy and drunk youths and running battles between police and juvenile delinquents thanks to the barring of children under the age of 18 from attending the country’s premier trade exhibition, police have said.

Previous ZITF editions closed with chaos in the city centre thanks to unruly youths.

Bulawayo police spokesperson, Inspector Abednico Ncube said there was relative peace on the Bulawayo streets during and after ZITF.

“Because this time around children weren’t allowed at ZITF, we did not have cases of Vuzu related parties. Usually when the Trade Fair ends, we used to have some running battles with some rowdy youths, flooding town and drinking alcohol and abusing drugs. Even this time around we were anticipating that even though the ZITF will be going on, youths could be engaged in some beer drinking sprees taking advantage of our deployment in ZITF.

“But the city centre was peaceful and we didn’t record any incidents of youths engaging in drugs and alcohol abuse. Generally, this was a different year and ZITF was very successful in terms of security and peace,” said Inspector Ncube.

There were no cases of car break-ins.

“During ZITF, and following our rigorous campaigns and deployments that took place as well as cooperation of our members of the public, Bulawayo didn’t record theft from motor vehicle cases, even robberies. The city was very calm. Of course, we were receiving cases here and there, but during the ZITF cases drastically reduced,” said Inspector Ncube.

He thanked the public for cooperating and working with the police.

“We worked according to our promise and plan that we were going to deploy enough manpower to deal with any criminal cases. And indeed, we enjoyed a peaceful ZITF and period thereafter,” said Inspector Ncube.

@bonganinkunzi