The acting Director of the Ghana Immigration Service (GIS), Mr Felix Yaw Sarpong, has called for the speedy passage of the GIS Bill into law to enable the service to prepare to execute its mandate in the election year.
He said the bill, which is currently before Parliament, would ensure that the requisite structures and resources needed to make the service, which is the first line of defence, perform its constitutional mandate.
That, he said, would ensure that the necessary administrative and operational gaps were filled in good time in order to enhance the role of the service before, during and after the elections.
Mr Sarpong said this when he interacted with some journalists in Accra last Friday.
Towards an effective GIS
The time had come, he said, for the GIS to step up its role to ensure that not only the borders of the country were professionally manned, but also that only legitimate persons were allowed entry, residence and employment for national and international security.
One crucial aspect of the bill, he said, was the move to make it possible for operatives of the service to wield firearms.
Such a development, he said, would make the work of the service at the various border posts very effective, since it would deter persons who intended to smuggle firearms and other dangerous weapons into the country.
Mr Sarpong said such a development had become more crucial in the face of the recent interception of arms and ammunition by the Customs Division at the Aflao Border.
Collaboration with the media
He urged the media to collaborate with the service, as had been the case in previous election years.
The media, he said, sometimes possessed information and had access to contacts that the service did not have, adding that the provision of timely information by the media would go a long way in assisting the service to effectively deal with any potential breach of immigration laws.
The Deputy Director of the GIS in charge of Finance and Administration, Mrs Beatrice Dzokoto-Lomoh, said even though the media had the role of setting the agenda for national discourse, there had been times when information placed in the public domain had not been accurate.
She, therefore, urged media practitioners to ensure that they checked very well with the relevant authorities before putting any information in the public domain.
The role of the media, she said, had become even more crucial this year, since it was an election year.
“Let us all collaborate to play our roles well, so that in the end we will have a stronger and more unified and peaceful Ghana,” she stressed.
