Police Command to meet EC officials soon – IGP

The Police Command would this month meet with officials of the Electoral Commission as part of its stakeholder engagement to work for a peaceful and successful general election in November.

Addressing a durbar of Police Personnel at Cape Coast, as part of his working visit to the Central Region, Mr John Kudalor, the Inspector General of Police, said maintaining the peace of the nation peace ahead of the election and thereafter, was a shared responsibility of all stakeholders.

He said his outfit had already met with the organisers of the youth wings of the various political parties, party executives, the Presidential Candidates and their running mates, as well as representatives of the media.

The IGP said: “The Police has a long arm but it cannot reach out to everyone”, therefore, it needed the support of everyone to be effective in its duties.

Consequently, he said, the Police Command was leaving no stone unturned, and urged the Police Personnel to eschew partisanship and be fair and firm.

Mr Kudalor said the Police Service was ready to deploy body guards to protect the various Presidential Candidates.

The selected officers had been given the needed skills training and logistics to enable them to perform their duties effectively, he said.

The 2016 Elections, the IGP said, had been described by some as “the Mother of all Elections” and the “Gadhafi of Elections” because it would be keenly contested.

Nevertheless, he said, the Police would be up to the tasks of ensuring order, peace and security.

Mr Kudalor, who said his visit to the Region formed part of the “IGP Dialogue Series”, interacted with the personnel to ascertain their readiness and plans for the job ahead in terms of skills, training and logistics.

He urged the Regional Commander to replicate the dialogue series across the Region by engaging the youth, opinion leaders, chiefs and political party leaders.

Before the meeting, the IGP inspected a simulation exercise at the Cape Coast Police headquarters, and rated his men and women at 80 per cent for the performance in respect of crowd control and self-comportment.

Mr Kudalor also inspected some logistics, including vehicles, bullet proof vests, plastic shots, tear gas grenade hand burst, hand-throwing smoke tear-gas grenade, stopper guns and rubber bullets for AK 47 riffles, among others.

The Central Regional Police Commander, Assistant Commissioner of Police (ASP) Kwame Tachie Poku, in his welcoming address, said the Region was relatively calm in terms of criminal activities.

From January to May this year, it recorded 22 robbery cases as against 67 around the same period last year, thus representing an 83 per cent reduction.

He said the Kasoa District accounted for 50 per cent of the cases and described the area as ‘crime prone ‘,

He, therefore, appealed to the IGP to grant a special allocation of equipment to the area to help combat crime.

ASP Poku said the current staff population of the Regional Command was 1,995, which he noted was in adequate to effectively manage the 2,006 polling stations and 465 flash points.

He announced that 1,016 police personnel had so far been trained in the Public-Order Management Programme.

The IGP who also paid separate courtesy calls on Osabarima Kwesi Atta II, the Omanhen of Oguaa Traditional Area and Mr Kweku Ricketts-Hagan, the Central Regional Minister, and appealed to them to give the Police the requisite support by calling their people to order if the need arose.

The Omanhen and the Regional Minister both called on the Police to be professional in the performance of their duties and urged them to work for Ghana but not for any political party.

They both expressed delight that the Police command was putting in place proactive measures to ensure incident free elections and pledged their support towards the cause

By-Graphic