The police administration in its attempts to enhance police transparency has plans to deploy body cameras by May 2019.
But a security analyst, Adam Bona has suggested that the police must do more than the body camera.
Police body cameras are small-lensed devices, often worn on an officer’s chest to capture images.
It has a microphone to record sounds and internal storage for data or footage for later review and analysis.
The administration would take delivery of the first batch of 300 pieces of body cameras in May 2019.
The move according to the service is to ensure the police make accountability a stronghold of the police administration following several reported cases of police brutalities that have gone unchecked.
Adam Bona said the police administration should instead set up an independent body to receive complaints from citizens which he said must be separated from the police administration.
[contextly_sidebar id=”5zkB6Vnu7a3I6dhMTABFYJEeNEhlSBRV”]Speaking to Citi News, Adam Bona said even though the move is in line with international best practices a holistic approach is needed to boost police transparency and accountability.
“One of my recommendations over the years have been, let’s have an independent national security agency citizens’ complaint commission or authority. The idea is that we all know that apart from the police, the military has also enforced the law in a way together with the police. We have the Immigration [service], sometimes, coming into the news about some of their officers allegedly extorting money from suspected illegal immigrants. So let’s craft a more holistic approach to this, just the body camera would not be a solution,” he said.
In January, the Vice President of Policy Think Tank, IMANI Africa, Selorm Branttie, asked the Ghana Police Service to embrace the use of modern technology as an effective way of dealing with the complex and changing face of crime in the country.
Following recent crimes such as the killing of an investigative journalist as well as the kidnapping of three girls in Takoradi, concerns have been raised about the way the police operates in an era where crime has become more sophisticated.
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By: Farida Yusif | citinewsroom.com | Ghana