Ambrose Dery
Minister of the Interior-designate, Ambrose Dery, has insisted that robbery incidents in recent times, including the shooting to death of the National Ambulance Service driver in the Eastern Region, cannot constitute a spike in armed robbery crime in his view.
According to him, much as armed robbery and other violent crimes were matters of concern to the Ministry and the government as whole, the string of robbery incidents “might not necessarily be an upsurge because one criterion does not support an upsurge, but that is no excuse. It is important to put matters in context.”
Appearing before the Appointments Committee of Parliament on Tuesday, Mr. Dery said the government was determined to fight to defeat armed robbery, and consequently expressed his condolences to all who had lost their loved ones in the commitment of these offences.
“It does not matter the numbers; it is something that we have to seriously deal with. But just to demonstrate, it might not necessarily be an upsurge because one criterion does not support an upsurge, but that is no excuse. It is important to put matters in context,” he said.
He disclosed that in January 2020, a total of 138 cases were recorded for robbery and violent crime, while this year in January recorded 121 cases, adding that “what has happened this year is special.”
High Profile Victims
“The victims are high profile victims. This unfortunate incident with the ambulance is the most abominable. Ambulances must be safe places when we are conveying our sick to the hospital.
“Some arrangements have been put in place immediately. As I speak to you, we have deployed patrols and combat patrols along the path. The tomato sellers are now escorted. We have also deployed alone in that area and we have actually moved staff and resources to do something about it,” Mr. Dery disclosed.
The minister-designate gave assurance that the Interior Ministry was committed to be working on the northern-border security project, which he said would help in dealing with crimes in the northern regions “because we are going to have immigration now that we are arming.”
“We are going to have different lines for soldiers to support and the deployment is going to be actually increased. What I must admit is that the criminals change their modus from time to time and we also need to change. We are introducing the tent city concept with the police, snap check points,” he told the committee on Tuesday.
“But I can assure you that going forward, the next two or three weeks you will find a different scenario,” he stated.
Logistics
On resourcing the security agencies, the minister-designate disclosed that the past four years had seen some improvement in logistical support.
He acknowledged that there had not been equitable distribution all over because the consideration was given to the police, the main agency dealing with law and order, noting that 740 vehicles and 179 motorbikes were given to the police.
“We have introduced different units. We have trained six pilots who passed out and back in the country. We have ordered helicopters and built the capacity of the marine unit with some boats. So, across the board we are providing some resources but we will be first to admit that we have not done enough,” he disclosed.
“If you go to Immigration, we have about 100 vehicles there and similar things have been provided for prisons and fire service. We have introduced equipment that will enable us to go 16 floors high and 500 metres.
“It is an ongoing process. Again the President made a commitment and made available GH¢800 million for police transformation… going forward we will increase the resources allocation to be able to make Ghana a safer place,” the Minister-desginate said.
By Ernest Kofi Adu