It is very interesting and laughable to read and hear from NPP big shots on the maintenance of peace and security. Notable among such gamut of lies and deceits were made by no mean other person like the party’s flag bearer, Nana Addo in a speech on peace and security in Koforidua on November 15, 2012. The said speech which further exposed the ignorance and desperation of the flag bearer was nothing but a collection of dubious and false claims.
As a security analyst who has keenly monitored security situations in Ghana, I dare say that the NDC track record in maintaining peace and security is unparallel and unprecedented. With virtually no message for Ghanaians, Nana Addo, like his serial callers, sought to hinge his peace and security campaign on isolated incidents in Akwatia, Atiwa and Chereponi. Ironically, Nana Addo was blaming government for those incidents when he and his cohorts go about preaching violence( All die be die and kill the Gas and Ewes). In the specific case for Atiwa, Nana Addo openly said that ‘Ye kyere won biribi kakra wo Atiwa’ which translates as we thought them something small in Atiwa. Making such statements and turning to blame government and the NDC party is hypocrisy at the highest level.
COMMUNAL VIOLENCE
The NPP and its flag bearer for the past years has, as indicated earlier, have consistently cited pockets of electoral violence in some places as failure on the part of government and the security agencies. Granted as they may be, it is clear that most of these attacks were planned and orchestrated by their own thugs. Indeed, when Hon. Kennedy Agyapong was arrested by the police for his reckless and treasonable statements, we saw how the NPP leadership mobilized its thugs to cause commotion and destroy properties at no other place than the police headquarters.
The NPP as government with its historical UP tradition has an unviable record of violence and must not profess to be more holier than the pope. The recent tape from Anthony Karbo brings memory of the gruesome murder of Ya-Naa Yakubu and several of his elders under the watch of the NPP government. Witnesses to that abominable act can attest to the fact that the fighters who collaborated with their local counterparts were non-Ghanaians who came in unregistered white pick-ups. This is a clear indication that these thugs were mercenaries from neighboring countries and were contracted to do that job in the same way that Karbo talks on the tape. Not to go into this so deeply, it suffice to say that Nana Addo was a cabinet minister but he and his government could neither prevent the act nor bring the culprits to justice. Indeed we were also told of the conspiracies surrounding this gruesome murders. Ghanaians are yet to know why the then IGP ordered all road blocks within the to be dismantled in that same week that the Yaa-Naa and his elders were massacred, and why the military armoured car could not move to the palace under the excuse that the battery was done, and then again why telephone lines in Yendi were disrupted that same day
CRIME RATES
Despites clear indications that crime rates have consistently dropped over the last three years, the NPP as a party wants Ghanaians to believe the contrary. The NPP now doubts official Police statistics which indicated that with the exception of rape and defilement, all forms of crimes including Armed Robbery which used to be perpetrated with impunity are declining. I heard one leading member of the NPP alluding to the fact that that might be because people do not report crimes. This is a complete lie because the level of confidence that people have in the police has improved tremendously. Besides, the Police now has a modern data base system of collating all criminal activities in the country and are able to issue reports on 24 hour basis. To solicit Police/public cooperation as an effective crime fighting strategy, the Police has established the community policing unit and the government through the support of its donor partners has put up a modern office complex at Tesano to serve as the headquarters. Hundreds of personnel have also been trained as community liason officers to decentralize the idea of community policing to the grassroots.
The good people of Ghana now know that transnational crimes, especially the scourge of drug and marauding drug barons with their cohorts in government and the security agencies who held the country hostage is no more. Ghana can now boast of a security system that has the capacity to check contemporary transnational crimes including Human Trafficking and money laundering.
ULTRA-MODERN FACILITIES
All over the world, crime fighting relies mainly on the ability of the agencies to quickly track and prosecute offenders, because such an effective way will not just keep potential criminals away but also eliminates criminal networks in a more rapid way. It is worth mentioning that the Ghana Police Service under the Better Ghana Agenda can now boast of a modern forensic laboratory with DNA and other facilities. This facility which is patronized by other counties is the first of its kind in West Africa.
The Police CID has also installed a modern Automated Finger Print Identification System that has the capacity to store the finger prints of the entire population of Ghana, thereby taking crime fighting to another level. This facility replaces the old system of comparing prints manually that was not only laborious but ineffective.
TRAINING FACILITIES
Nana Addo in that November 15 speech alluded that “most importantly we will ensure that that the Detective Training School is rehabilitated and well equipped to provide more detective training to our men and women’. It is very sad and indeed fascinating to hear such a statement coming from someone who aspires to be a president. The detective Training School that Nana Addo spoke about got burnt in the first term of the NPP administration but nothing was done the neither about the School nor alternative means of training personnel. Soon after coming into power, the NDC government found alternatives by training detectives outside the country and in most instances relying on other available facilities locally. The idea is that the burnt school must not hold back the training of detectives. On the more substantive issue, I want to use this medium to inform Nana Addo and his inexperienced security advisors that the Detective School that he profess to rehabilitate in the unlikely event of he coming to power, has been completely rebuilt and furnished with the needed facilities and was recently commissioned by president Mahama at the Police Training School in Tesano, and so they should spare us another bout of lies and deceits.
LOGISTICS
It is gratifying to note that the NDC government has provided the security services with more vehicles and other logistics than any government in the history of this country. The erstwhile Kuffour administration secured 200 Peugeot vehicles from Nigeria for the Ghana Police Service, a feat that was well applauded. This numbers do not come near the almost 2000 vehicles acquired by the NDC government for the police so far. Other logistics provided in huge quantities include communication gadgets, crime scene equipment, bullet proof vests, riot control equipment, etc.
The Police Service in order to maintain effective internal security has maintained specialized units since independence. One of such units is the Armoured Car Squadron. Prior to the NPP coming into power, the previous NDC government had purchased several vehicles including water Cannons for the unit but the NPP government in their eight years watched unconcerned to see the units collapse without adding a single vehicle or equipment to the unit.
Thanks to the better Ghana Agenda, the Police Armoured Squad now has taken delivery of almost 100 modern armoured vehicles within the past four years. when I did my last check a couple of days ago, I unravelled that the government had entered into an agreement with Paramount Group, a south African based armoured vehicle company to further supply the unit with more modern robust public order management and crime fighting vehicles and equipment. Indeed, the vehicles and the equipment had arrived with trainings ongoing as at the time of putting this piece together. These are real tangible security concerns and not the rhetorics that the NPP is noted for. In 2004, Mr. Hackman Owusu Agyeman, the then minister of interior assured the whole nation that the government had acquired a helicopter to enhance the Police operations and that the Helicopter was due to arrive by December 2004. Almost eight years now, we are yet to see the promised helicopter. The NDC government has taken policing to another level by creating the Marine Police and equipping it with six new Speed boats for a start (two patrol vessels currently been constructed in Holland and South Africa). Plans are far advanced to take delivery of helicopters for the Ghana Police to strengthen the newly created SWAT. The introduction of the Tent city concepts within some localities has also further made our communities much safer. Other interventions include Intelligence acquisition, analysis and application strategy, leading to the establishment of Intelligence Centre in the Service, re-activation of the Informant Reward System, where contributions of the public in the form of provision of information are rewarded with amount ranging from GH¢ 2,000.00 to GH¢ 20,000.00 and the deepening of police presence through massive and intensive day and night patrols
There is no doubt that such proactive measures and massive retooling of the police coupled with the high level of motivations have begun yielding great dividends in the fight against crime. The increased visibilities of the police in our communities are obvious for all to see.
The story with the Ghana Armed Forces is not different. Interventions in the GAF is seen by analysts as the largest reequipping of the armed forces in the history of Ghana. The NDC government inherited armed forces that had a severely eroded capacity in terms of equipment and logistics. The situation has completely changed within four years; two surveillance aircraft, two hangers and a stimulator base station located at the Takoradi Air Force Base, two vessels to enhance the protection of the country’s marine and air space against foreign aggression have been provided. The surveillance aircraft for the Air Force and the two vessels for the Ghana Navy are to check drug trafficking, arms smuggling, dumping of toxic waste, illegal bunkering, illegal fishing, and pair trawling. Four newly built ships (Ghana Navy Ship BLIKA (P34), Ghana Navy Ship GARINGA (P35), Ghana Navy Ship CHEMLE (P36) and Ghana Navy Ship EHWOR (P37)) have also been acquired for the Ghana Navy’s fleet. Others include new fleet of Armoured Personnel Carriers (APCs), Troop Carrying Vehicles (TCVs), engineer equipment, and personal weapons and gears. The Ghana Air Force would again take delivery of four (4) newly-built helicopters from Russia by the end of this year, a a 500-bed military hospital for the Northern Command of the Ghana Armed Forces in Kumasi will soon start, there are also plans to increase the capacity of the 37 Military Hospital by the addition of a 600-bed facility and the increment of theatres to 12, so that each department would have its own theatre.
In addition, a permanent garrison has been set up at Bawku and the first phase of the construction of the structures at Basua has been completed and troops deployed to the garrison.
Other projects for the GAF include the ongoing, constructions at the Roman Ridge to provide accommodation for the commandants, Chief of Air Staff and other senior officers, four-storey building will also be put up at Beijing barracks for senior NCOs; another four-storey, which will include three bedrooms, six-unit building for senior officers would also be put up at Burma Camp. Mention must also be made of the four-storey building, housing three bed rooms each, together with boys’ quarters is set to be constructed at Labadi. Above all, the government has secured a whooping 50 million Chinese loan facility to solve the accommodation problem of the military to prevent some from living outside the barracks
The speedy modernization of the Ghana Armed Force (GAF) will surely be taken to another level in the next four years under the advancing the better Ghana agenda.
The Ghana National Fire Service has for the past four years, benefited from 152 new fire-fighting vehicles and equipment and officer training programmes in the USA, United Kingdom and Belgium. Almost 2,000 new personnel were recruited into the Service. Seventy five (75) additional modern fire tenders will soon arrive from India for distribution to the various fire service stations in the country to augment the initial 152. In addition, several firefighting equipment including breathing apparatus, firefighting suits and compressors had also been bought for distribution to the stations to ensure that service personnel provided their best in the control of fire and rescue of victims during fire outbreaks and other disasters.
For the Ghana Immigration Service, thousands have been recruited to beef up its strength, hundreds of vehicles provided, a Digital Border Surveillance System (CCT and Wi-Fi systems) was introduced and an e-immigration project was implemented. A Document Fraud Expertise Centre was set up and the Immigration Act, 2000, Act 573, was amended to criminalize human smuggling. A comprehensive national migration policy that will tackle all aspects of migration is almost ready
The Prisons service, like their counterparts have also been adequately resourced. Notable among these include a new medium security prison at Ankaful; the biggest in West Africa.
Under phase two, the Ankaful prison is expected to be a model prison which will compare with any worldwide.
The Service has also being provided with the needed logistics and manpower resources to make it more efficient.
MANPOWER AND TRAINING
Several specialized trainings within and outside the country have been undertaken within the last for years. These include the retraining of all police personnel on modern democratic policing strategies to make our officers more responsive to international standards. As part of the 5 year policing strategic plan (first policing strategic road map in the history of Ghana) which was launched by President Mahama (then vice president) in May 2010 has resulted into the recruitment of thousands of specialists and general police officers (about 6,000) at my last check with about two thousand currently under training and thousands more yet to train, that is way above NPP’s whole eight years. Kwabena Agyapong on Saturday 24th November 2012 made another wild claim on Joy FM’s news file that their government had trained thousands of police officers only for NDC to take over government and dismiss all of them. I say on record that such a thing never happened and can never happen in Ghana. Indeed, the NPP recruited some police officers, mainly party faithful (we still remember the party police scandals) during their tenure but not even a single of them was laid off, except through normal police standards of discipline as it pertains to all.
HOSPITALS FOR THE SECURITY SERVICES
The military and Police hospitals are two vital institutions within the security circles that are of great concern to our men and women in uniforms. The military hospital which serves a large section of the Ghanaian public has seen massive improvement within the last four years including the installations of an MRI facility. The Police hospital for instance provide medical services not only to police personnel and their families but also to personnel from other security services and their families as well as the general public. The hospital has also received massive inputs from the NDC government, including the provision of dialysis center, renovation of theaters, provision of ambulances, provision of mobile clinics and tremendous recruitment of more medical personnel. It is interesting to note that Nana Addo was a member of cabinet when the government signed a deal to get the long awaited expansion project of the Police Hospital. The story ended barely weeks after the contractor moved to site. After playing political games with the project, the NPP left power without any effort to secure the necessary funding. Thanks to NDC, The Hospital project has commenced with necessary funding needed to complete it ready. The project will see the Police Hospital …………………………………… These projects are concrete steps been taken to improve the welfare of personnel of the security agencies and not the empty rhetorics been espoused by Nana Addo.
ACCOMODATION
Despite serious attempts to get our officers in uniformed get decent accommodation through the failed STX deal, the NDC government has showed it commitments by providing alternative arrangements. Several residential accommodations have been constructed by the government for personnel of the security agencies. The police for instance have had over 49 major office and residential accommodations spread across the country that have been abandoned for so many years constructed. To further solve the accommodation problem, dormitories that can take over 500 personnel have been constructed in all the regions to temporally cater for fresh recruits who are posted to the regions. Hundreds of police stations have been built across the country. A visit to the National Police Training school, Police College and other police training institutions reveals tremendous improvement in infrastructure over the past four years. Above all police officers can now rent private residential accommodations and get a percentage of their monthly salaries reimbursed.
OTHER CONDITIONS
Apart from health and shelter, the security officers who risk their lives to protect we the ordinary citizens need to be motivated. The Single spine salary structure that saw the improvements in the salaries of our security officers by a gargantuan proportion, some as high as 900 percent is an over flogged issue. To further shows its commitment to the security services, the NDC government has pushed through parliament a new set of rules that if well implemented will see so much goodies not only in the life of our police officers, but their professional output. The Act (CI 76) which took effect from October first will see a complete improvement of the conditions of the Police, right from recruitment to retirement, as well as their mode of operations. The act makes room for decentralization for effective policing and several other financial and non-financial incentives for our men and women in uniforms
The best for the security services is yet to come .The Ghana Police Service for instance is set procure and install communication equipment in patrol vehicles and at Operations Command Centers, provided with additional hundreds of vehicles, provide specialized training for the Special Weapons and Tactics (SWAT) Unit and other units(all to ensure timely response to distress calls), and construct extra residential and office accommodation for the Police including the rehabilitation of all regional police clinics, recruitment of thousands of junior, senior and specialized officers, effectively implement the CI 76 which has some decentralization elements and many more. Similar programmes are already in place for the other security services.
In the midst of all these the NPP had the audacity to doubt the efforts of the NDC government. No wonder their flag bearer and other leading members have resorted to lies and deceit. The NPP 2012 manifestoes portion on internal security is indeed a piece of joke. Ghanaian should not be surprised to hear Nana Addo in the coming days espousing his 419 free SHS policy as a solution to the maintenance of peace and security in Ghana.
AHMED DEEDAT
a.deedat@yahoo.com
The writer is security analyst based in Ghana
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