COP Prosper Agblor, D/G of CID and Chief Supt . Lawrencia Akorle in a group photograph with participants and resource persons
A three-day training workshop has been organized for administrators of the Data Collection Unit of the Domestic Violence and Victims Support Unit (DOVVSU) to equip them with the requisite knowledge to generate reports on domestic, sexual and gender based violence that will meet international standards.
Director-General of the Criminal Investigations Department, COP Prosper Kwame Agblor, at the opening, said DOVVSU is mandated to specifically handle domestic violence issues, particularly against children and vulnerable adults.
The primary objective of the unit is to create conducive atmosphere which will enable domestic violence victims to freely lodge their complaints.
DOVVSU also collaborates with stakeholders in order to provide a coordinated and timely response to help victims of abuse.
He stated that DOVVSU has over the years served as the only credible source of information or statistics on domestic violence, as well as sexual and gender based violence in Ghana.
“As part of its commitment to providing credible information on violence issues, and child related offences, DOVVSU assists the country with credible statistics to be able to respond to the request from the international community, notable among them is the United Nations Commission on status of women.
The Director-General of CID confirmed that DOVVSU is committed to providing a well structured, credible and easily accessible database.
“The unit, as part of its work for 2016 and in collaboration with the United Nations Population Fund (UNFDP), has helped to develop a data management system that will readily share information on sexual and gender based violence in an open source by the click of a button.
He said in pursuit of this goal, DOVVSU has undertaken series of activities and met stakeholders to analyze and validate the existing data template in order to obtain a more purposeful one.
Chief Superintendent Lawrencia Akorle, the Coordinating Director in-charge of DOVVSU, in an address, said her unit has in the past provided data for national, international, individuals and organizations for both academic and non-academic research works.
“It is in this light that DOVVSU, with support from the UNFDP, has updated the unit’s data collection to a more elaborate, detailed, usable format to generate reports to meet international standards.
By Linda Tenyah-Ayettey