Police sleep in workshops due to lack of accommodation
Police personnel in parts of the Central Region are facing acute residential and office accommodation challenges.
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In Cape Coast, 90 people recently recruited at the Police Training School are being housed at the police workshop at the Central Regional Police Command owing to lack of accommodation facilities.
At Apam, about 50 police personnel who were accommodated at the police barracks have been evacuated for safety reasons because of the dilapidated state of the barracks.
They have since been housed in rented accommodation.
Another police station at Bedaadua in the Assin North municipality has also been closed, while all six police personnel stationed there have been transferred to Assin Akropong because of the poor condition of the barracks.
During a visit to the Central Regional Police Command last Thursday, it came to light that the workshop had been divided into three ‘dormitories’, each accommodating about 30 recruits.
The dormitories have no beds and the recruits lie on mattresses, some without mosquito nets.
The recruits are also exposed to reptile attacks, while their sanitary facilities are in a deplorable state.
Conducting the Daily Graphic round the workshop, the officer in charge of the workshop, Superintendent John Kobina Tagoe, said the facility being used as "dormitories" was supposed to be the driving school for the service.
In an interview, the Central Regional Police Commander, Deputy Commissioner of Police Mr Rayford Moses Ninson, said there were many police facilities in deplorable conditions in the region, while many projects had not been completed.
At a durbar of security personnel held during the visit of the Central Regional Minister, Mr Samuel Sarpong, to the Central Regional Police Command in Cape Coast on Tuesday, Mr Ninson said the dire accommodation situation of police personnel in the region was a source of grave concern to the Ghana Police Service.
He said the situation did not augur well for effective work, adding that there had not been any renovation of the various barracks and police stations in the region in many years.
Mr Ninson, who assumed duty in the region recently, said the situation, though not peculiar, negatively affected the state of mind of the personnel and was likely to reduce their effectiveness and efficiency,.
"Obviously people cannot have the peace of mind to work if they stay in such conditions," he said.
The regional commander appealed to the Central Regional Minister to help ensure that the barracks were completed.
At that durbar, representatives of other security agencies, including the Ghana National Fire Service and the Ghana Immigration Service, also appealed to the regional minister to help resolve the accommodation challenges.
Responding to the appeals, Mr Sarpong said the government was working to improve the well-being of security personnel in the country.
He commended the personnel for their dedication to work and for helping to ensure a violent free general election in the region last year.
Mr Sarpong also noted the relative peace and low crime rate in the region and commended the security personnel in that regard.
He urged them to work even harder to ensure a peaceful environment that could attract investors.
He urged them to work hard to flush out illegal miners whose activities were polluting the rivers in the region.
Mr Ninson took the minister round abandoned barracks behind the police headquarters, construction of which started over 35 years ago.
Mr Sarpong later visited the Ankaful Maximum Security Prison where the authorities appealed to him to ensure that the prisons area was exempted from the power rationing exercise.
They also appealed to the government to provide the prison with vehicles, pointing out that escorting prisoners to the hospital and courts in taxis was dangerous.
By Shirley Asiedu-Addo/Ghana