As part of activities to keep officers fit, the Ghana Immigration Service (GIS) at the Kotoka International Airport (KIA) on Saturday, held its maiden health walk to sensitise workers on the need to adopt healthy lifestyles.
The walk started from Ayi Mensah toll booth and ended at the Peduase Lodge at Aburi, in the Eastern Region.
The Assistant Commissioner of Immigration (ACI), Commander of KIA, Edith Penelope Arhin said, a lot of excuse duties we recorded every week from both male and female officers from the various clinics hence, compelled them to embark on the health walk.
According to her, embarking on such activities regularly would make officers strong and healthy to enable them carry out their activities saying,“A healthy mind is a healthy body.”
Madam Arhin stated that, although she has been advising officers to use their free time for vigorous exercises, she believed that exercising in groups was more effective done performing it individually.
She indicated that, most night workers had a lot of health issues due to their poor eating habits adding that “when they are done with the last flight after 10,they eat heavy food and later report with health issues such hypertension, cholesterol increase.”
Madam Arhin explained that, theirduty wasto ensure that passengers arriving and departing from the country were processed.
“If my people are not strong and healthy, they cannot report to work and discharge their duties effectively to make our country attractive to foreigners,” she added.
Madam Arhin disclosed that, the Service intended to introduce roll ups to help erode misconceptions about immigration officers and enable passengers passing through identify their officers with ease.
“There is a misconception about airport that everyone who works at the airport is an immigration officer, from airline to the last boarding gate,so if anyone does something wrong then officers are blamed,” she stated.
Madam Arhin said, the roll up would be in a form of a flag which would have pictures of officers in the various immigration uniforms posted to enable passengers to know the real officers.
BY ABEDUWAA LUCY APPIAH
