K’si: Prospective police recruits besiege GCB Bank

Over 200 prospective applicants who are seeking to be recruited into the Ghana Police Service besieged the premises of the GCB Bank in Kumasi on May 9, 2016 to purchase application forms.

The Service has resorted to electronic means in receiving applications in its quest to reducing the involvement of middlemen, more commonly referred to as ‘goro boys’.

Previous recruitments have been marred by scams, the most recent one leading to some servicemen, including the Director General of Police Human Resource and Administration, COP Patrick Timbillah, being interdicted.

Applicants were divided on the new system of application. Some welcomed the online system of application saying it would eliminate extortion of money from desperate applicants by persons posing as agents who end up bolting with their cash. “But this one it is online, so there is no cheating. Even if there will be cheating, it wouldn’t be like the other one (manual). So, me, I prefer the online [application],” one applicant who revealed he was making his tenth attempt at enlisting in the Police Service told Class News’ Hafiz Tijani on Monday May 9.

Others favoured the electronic application because it had done away with the stress of queuing up for hours to submit an application, as the new method ensured that submission could now be done in a few minutes. Another said he was happy applications were now online, as forms, which he believed were deliberately hijacked in the past to prevent others from making applications, would now be available.

But another applicant told Hafiz that applying through electronic means would not allow him to seek the assistance of highly placed persons to influence the process in his favour, as was the situation with the manual. He feared the system would also be skewed against persons with poor grades.