COMMISIONER of Police, Graphael Musamba has directed police under the intellectual property unit (IPU) and information technology (IT) section to acquire superior skills to effectively fight software piracy.

Mr Musamba said in Lusaka yesterday that the country's software piracy was rated at 82 per cent, a situation which he described as pathetic.

South Africa was rated at 34 per cent while the United States was 20 per cent.

Mr Musamba, who was speaking during a one-day microsoft software piracy training workshop, said the officers should acquire all necessary skills and capacity to effectively detect and prosecute offences of software piracy.

"This workshop should equip you with all necessary skills and capacity to fight all manner of intellectual property infringements which include software piracy," Mr Musamba said.

To reduce software piracy and other related vices, he said the police service had put measures like setting up a permanent IPU comprising 15 officers who were the course participants.

He said from the inception, the IPU had conducted several raids on institutions such as banks and other business houses in relation to the software piracy as a way to fight the vice in the country.

"I must state that these raids have in a way worked to reduce instances of software piracy and have also reiterated the need for training of officers to enhance their performance in order to curb the vice," Mr Musamba said.

He implored the course participants to take the training seriously to bring down the high levels of software piracy in Zambia through the skills and knowledge imparted on them.

Mr Musamba hailed Microsoft Kenya for its continued support rendered to the Zambia Police Service on the computer-based crimes, saying its collaboration in the fight against such crimes had been valuable.

Speaking earlier, Microsoft East and Southern Africa licensing compliance manager, Andrew Waititu, said his organisation would impart further skills to the trainees to enable them detect piracy offences efficiently.

"We shall try our best to ensure these course participants acquire the best knowledge and skills out of this training workshop," Mr Waititu said.