Chairman of the Commission for Human Rights and Good Governance, retired principal judge Amiri Manento, has spoken of the changing face of the killing of elderly people, especially in the lake zone regions.
He told editors in Dar es Salaam on Thursday that reports gathered by his commission indicate that substantial number of elderly killing of the elderly is presently associated with wealth, with witchcraft being cited as an excuse.
"About 60 per cent of elderly killings nowadays are associated with wealth and not witchcraft as it used to be some years ago," he said during a media workshop on human rights.
Elaborating, Mr Manento said most victims are widowed women who had inherited wealth from their dead husbands.
He said normally youths from a distant village are hired to kill widows so that they (youths) could take her inherited property like livestock or farm produce.
“Because the hired killers came from distant villages, most of the killings occur not later than 9pm because the killers have to rush to their home villages,” he said, insisting that it was rare for such killings to occur after that time.
Mr Manento said, however, that the Government's resolve to build more schools in the country, would help reduce the problem as ignorance is the cause of murders.
"I believe that with education, many people will become aware that the killings will not make them rich,"he said.
In his opening remarks, Mr Manento urged the media to effectively involve itself in public awareness campaign and education programmes to assist in reducing the killings.
"The media has a duty to make sure the ruling elite adhere to principles of good governance which include transparency, accountability, integrity, freedom of the press and rule of law," he said.
