The Ghana Police Service will take delivery of three helicopters in November to enhance its work.
The platforms include two gazelle light attack helicopters and one Airbus 350 helicopter. Six pilot officers who would fly the aircrafts have completed their training in South Africa.
This was disclosed by President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo at the 50th Cadet Officers’ Graduation Parade at the Police Academy in Accra, where 129 officers were appointed into the senior officer corps of the Service.
The cadets are the first batch of the Service’s maiden nine-month course with a curriculum tailored to international standards and best practices in policing.
Cadets pursue more academic work now than in the previous six months course.
Those who pass the academic component of the course are awarded a Post-Graduate Diploma Certificate in Security Studies.
Speaking at the event, the President noted that Government, in recognition of the difficulties and dangers confronting police personnel in the discharge of their duties, remained committed to resourcing the Service, by the provision of adequate personnel and logistics to enable them deliver on their mandate.
“To this end, since I came to office in January 2017, a total of 568 vehicles, including 15 operational buses, have been presented by Government to the Service, a feat unprecedented in its history,” he said.
President Akufo-Addo disclosed that apart from the existing Formed Police Unit (FPU) in Accra, an additional 22 light armoured vehicles have been procured for use by the FPUs to be established in November in the Northern, Upper East and Ashanti Regions.
He said that FPUs will be established in the remaining regions that do not have such Unit in the next year and a half.
“Two hundred motorbikes have also been distributed to members of the Community Policing initiative to boost the presence of the Police in our communities. Modern communication equipment and four thousand, five hundred (4,500) fragmentation jackets have been procured and delivered to the Service to protect officers, and help ensure effective policing.
“At the beginning of my mandate, in 2017, there were 800 CCTV installations in the country for surveillance. At the end of my first term, the figure had gone up to 6,500, and, by the end of the year, another 3,500 would have been added, making a total of almost 11,000 in the country,” he said.
The President told the gathering that the Government had strengthened the cybercrime-fighting capabilities of the Service, through the setting up of a Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT) Centre at the National Communications Authority (NCA).
He revealed that that the Ministry of the Interior had procured three Alligator Silver boats to expand and resource the Marine Police, in order to help them work with the Ghana Navy towards protecting the country’s maritime waters, and its offshore oil and gas installations.
President also disclosed that for the first time in the history of the Criminal Investigative Department of the Ghana Police Service, crime officers are being given a monthly allowance to support their investigations.
He said the construction of 320 housing units at the National Police Training School is at an advanced stage of completion. Work is ongoing on the construction of a barracks at Kwabenya, to replace the one adjacent to the DVLA at 37, which is not fit for purpose. A new mechanical workshop for the Service is also being constructed at Bohye, near Haatso.
In addition to the yearly increments of salaries for all police personnel, Government, he said, has placed them, like the other members of the security services, under the CAP 30 pension scheme.
“Clearance has been given for the Police Service to recruit some 5,000 more personnel to augment the manpower base of the Service, in a bid to meet the recommended UN police-civilian ratio of one-to-five hundred people,” he said.