Image redemption mission for Upper West police

Michael Quaye Opinion Apr - 24 - 2014 , 04:59

A neat line-up of motorbikes adorns a part of the Upper West Regional Police Headquarters compound, their presence forced by operations to retrieve stolen bikes and to lay hands on miscreants.

A regular squad of civilians visit the police facility like patients calling on a doctor, but many of these ‘patients’ leave this ‘consulting room’ with little reprieve – if their facial expressions are anything to go by.

That kind of ‘identification parade’ on the corridors of the regional police headquarters in Wa has become a routine regimen for both civilians and police officers recently but that seems not to affect the fate of the 53 motorbikes standing at the mercy of a weather that swings between extremes under the command of nature.

Trial

At least 11 persons are facing trial for various breaches – including motorbike theft – following the operations, while more than 30 of those motorbikes have had nobody showing up to claim ownership, let alone demand possession.

The operations had sought to bring some order into society – particularly in the wake of rampant motorbike thefts – to reignite the public’s confidence in the police force.

Regaining good reputation

Following the impressive results from the operations, some amount of reputation appears to have been restored for the police in the region .

For a security outfit so tainted with instances of corruption over the years, the police have struggled vainly to shed the cloak that nearly nullified the moral authority of their uniform. That the advent of the Single Spine Pay Policy failed to undo the corruptive tendencies among them– as perceived by the public– has proven rather damaging to the force many times.

Such was the situation that police operations were seen as yet another strategy to collect from motorists ‘road tolls’ (a term that refers to money extorted by the police from drivers and other road users), a perception conveyed by Ali Seidu, a motorbike mechanic.

“But this time, they did well for us; two people came here to repair their stolen bikes which were retrieved by the police through their operations,” Seidu said in an interview.

The challenge

The Regional Police Commander, Assistant Commissioner of Police Kwasi Mensah Duku, maintains, however, that “the dilemma remains a challenge we must work to overcome, both in terms of our work as a professional force and the misconceptions that taint our reputation”.

He insists that “many times, perception is confused with fact such that even the most genuine of intentions are given wrong interpretation,” but he concedes that they are not a group of perfect people.

In January this year, a discussant on a morning radio talk show alleged police complicity in the operations of armed robbers within the Upper West Region. Muniru Abdulai Zion had alleged on locally based Sung-Maale FM that the police hierarchy was aware of an armed robbery training camp in Wa and the local police personnel were in bed with the group of robbers.

The allegation provoked a swift police reaction within minutes as personnel interrupted the talk show, took Muniru Zion into custody and seized some items from the radio station to enable the police to “retrieve the allegation on tape”.

The subsequent apology appeared belated for, especially the media, which took issues beyond the mere limits of the expression of so-called solidarity with one of their own into the realm of an assault on media freedom.

“We are a human institution and we may err sometimes,” admitted ACP Duku.

Police patrols

But certainly, they have hardly erred in terms of the impact of their visibility in town, their alertness and general reaction to crime and the determination to win the war against crime.

A shop owner in Wa, who identified himself only as Hafiz, said: “I thought the police were a nuisance until they rescued my shop from potential robbery one day.

“Three young men came to my shop and demanded my sales for the day but they bolted before I could say anything when a police patrol team showed up on the street amidst the blowing of their siren, announcing their presence. When I got out, there were other police personnel, both men and women, also patrolling on foot.

“I alerted them and they took the path the men had taken. It was a narrow escape for me.”

In Wa alone, there is police visibility at the main market/lorry station where a cluster of banks are situated, while two tents in different suburbs, a container police post at another suburb and another on the old Wa campus of the University for Development Studies (UDS) complement the regular patrols across the streets and towns day and night.

“We are expanding our operations in response to and in anticipation of specific situations. “But more importantly, we want to identify with the civilian public by being closer to them so that we can collaborate to keep society in order. The whole idea is to be proactive rather than waiting to react,” ACP Duku said.

Police districts

Indeed, in all seven police districts in the Upper West Region, namely Funsi, Nadowli, Jirapa, Lawra, Gwolu, Tumu and Wa, the police seem to have their feet firm on the ground as suggested by the Director-General of the Criminal Investigations Department of the Ghana Police Service, Mr Prosper Agblor, when he visited the region recently.

Some 150 motorbikes were seized during those operations in February, nearly a 100 of them have so far been released to their owners. The operations zeroed in on bikes without original keys, bikes without appropriate documentation and those not registered.

“Many bike thieves are able to re-engineer the stolen bike into an entirely new system with different chassis numbers, new seats, new keys, etc.,” Staff Officer of the regional police command and acting Public Relations Officer of the Upper West Regional Police Command, Assistant Superintendent of Police Edmund Nyamekye, explained.

“It takes experience, vigilance and a meticulous effort to detect these,” he added.

Now and future

For now, the police may have shown courage in the face of deprivation, as has become synonymous with the Upper West Region. But even the obvious lack of official accommodation for personnel and the fact that the regional command shares common premises with the district command in a modest edifice do not seem to dampen the spirits of both officers and men.

Perhaps, the 14.94-acre plot of land at Sombo acquired for the purposes of constructing a new regional command office and a police clinic which has just started in Wa would one day attest to their efforts and symbolise the kind of tenacity that has made the Upper West Regional Police Service a fearsome bunch whose name evokes a sense of discipline in the society.