Rwanda National Police (RNP) has expressed its appreciation to all the participants in the just concluded 2016 African Nations Championship (CHAN) for their cooperation in ensuring that the tournament is held in a complete secure atmosphere.

Rwanda hosted the fourth edition of the African Nations Championship - the biennial international football championship organised by the Confederation of African Football (CAF) - that kicked off on January 16 running for three weeks and ended yesterday.

The tournament attracted a total of 16 teams from across the continent, they include, Tunisia, Morocco, Guinea, Mali, Angola, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Ethiopia, Uganda, Gabon, DR Congo, Niger, Nigeria, Ivory Coast, Cameroon and Rwanda the host.

The tournament ended yesterday with DR Congo emerging the winner after a 3-0 victory against Mali.

"Besides the fact that the tournament was well organised by all stakeholders, including Rwanda National Police, throughout the games, we didn’t witness any security issues. We had our officers escort delegates, players and fans throughout their stay even during trainings,” said the Police Spokesperson, Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) Celestin Twahirwa.

The cooperation by the tournament officials was impeccable and facilitating security organs and vice versa. Besides yesterday’s finals, other most watched matches in the tournament included a game between Rwanda and DR Congo which attracted many fans from DR Congo and locals.

The highly anticipated Rwanda-DR Congo game saw police escorting hundreds of Congolese fans all the way from Rubavu-Goma border to Kigali to attend the game. A considerable number of fans travelled from Uganda and DR Congo during the whole tournament and we appreciate the level of compliance they exhibited in their movements together with their Rwanda counterparts, added Twahirwa.

"The manner in which fans behaved was impressive; all our security checks were manned well and we didn’t experience any breach of security measures not even on our checkpoints. We remain confident that our institutions have matured enough to host event bigger international events,” said ACP Twahirwa.

Meanwhile, at the end of the tournament, the acting president of CAF hailed Rwanda and President Paul Kagame for the well organised and secure tournament, noting that it’s the first time in the history of CHAN to have a tournament that draws such a massive turnout and conducted in an extremely secure manner.

"The tournament and all other side events went on well in a peaceful environment, this is proof that Rwanda is a very secure country,” Hayatou said.

The tournament was played on four host stadiums, including Amahoro National Stadium and Kigali regional stadium both in Kigali City, Huye stadium in the Southern Province and Umuganda Stadium in Rubavu, Western Province.

This is the third continental sporting event successfully hosted by Rwanda after the 2009 African Youth Championships as well as the 2011 African U-17 Championship.