President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo has renewed government’s commitment to resourcing the security services in the country to better position them to discharge their duty of protecting citizens against terrorism and other external force.
“To enhance the capability of security forces to prevent spillage into the country, we will try and support you to discharge your duties effectively by providing you with the necessary logistics, human resource and appropriate policy,” the President stressed.
President Akufo-Addo stated this when he interacted with heads of the various security services at the 10 Mechanised Battalion Barracks at Wa on Sunday when he commenced a three-day official visit to the Upper West Region.
As part of his tour, the President would inspect ongoing projects such as the Regional Youth Resource Centre as well as projects under government’s Agenda 111 and also inaugurate a solar power project at Kaleo.
“Government has introduced programmes aimed at strengthening border security, specifically our northern borders due to activities of terrorists in the Sahel region such as Burkina Faso and Mali, most of whom share boundaries with the country to the north,” he said.
He stressed that government had taken major decisions around improving the logistical base of the work of the security services and said several other provisions in the last budget went to reinforce what has already been done by government to improve their conditions of service.
President Akufo-Addo indicated that the security service would not be able to work successfully in isolation without the support and cooperation of the citizenry, and appealed to Ghanaians, particularly those residing along the nation’s borders, to collaborate with the security agencies in order to squash activities of terrorists and extremists.
“Security requires the collective involvement of yourself and the civilian population, you need the cooperation of the civilian population and it has to be a very important part in your planning as to how to foster good relations with civilians to work together to protect all of us,” he mentioned.
President Akufo-Addo announced that government would introduce key social interventions at the border areas to help reduce vulnerability of the people around the area so that they are not susceptible to recruitment into terrorist groups.
The President was accompanied by the Minister of Information, Mr Kojo Oppong Nkrumah; Defence Minister, Mr Dominic Nitiwil; Minister for the Interior, Mr Ambrose Dery; Roads and Highways Minister, Mr Kwesi Amoako Atta, and the Minister for Local Government, Rural Development and Decentralisation, Mr Dan Botwe.
FROM LYDIA DARLINGTON FORDJOUR, WA
