Ministry to probe Security Companies(Front Page) August 18, 2008

Story: Michael Donkor

THE Ministry of the Interior has instituted investigations into allegations that some security organisations are training their guards with weapons, contrary to regulations guiding the industry.
Consequently, the General Secretary of the Union of Private Security Employees of Ghana (UPSEG), Nana Kofi Adu II, is to be invited to assist the ministry fish out these companies.
The Minister of the Interior, Dr Kwame Addo-Kufuor, who made this known in an interview with the Daily Graphic in Accra yesterday, said it was an offence to train private security personnel with weapons.
He said after the investigations, companies found to be culpable of the offence would be dealt with, according to the law.
He, however, appealed to anybody with information about private security companies that operated contrary to the laws to report his ministry or the police.
Nana Adu II last Monday alleged at a news conference in Accra that some private security organisations were training their guards with weapons, contrary to regulations guiding the industry.
He said if the situation was not checked, it could destabilise the peace and security of the nation, particularly during the December elections.
He said some of these security companies were also training their personnel at unknown areas, making it difficult for them to be monitored and checked.
“We are convinced that not all these companies can easily be located or their mode of operations clearly known by the police and the Ministry of the Interior. We also suspect that some of them could be armed, which to us, is illegal and dangerous for the security of the state,” Nana Adu added.
In another development, a security expert, Dr Emmanuel Kwesi Enning, has called for a revision of the law regulating the operation of private security organisations in the country to inject sanity into their operations, reports Kofi Yeboah.
He said the existing legal frameworks regulating the industry, such as the Police Service Act, 1970 (Act 350), and LI 1671, which was revised in 1994, were weak and needed to be reinforced.
Dr Enning, who made the call in an interview with the Daily Graphic, observed that some of the private security companies, for instance, used sirens on their vehicles and dressed in a manner akin to the police, contrary to the law.
He said although the law prohibited private security operatives from using guns, a private security worker who owned a gun and had registered it could take the weapon to work without offending the law.
Dr Enning, who is the Head of Conflict Prevention, Management and Resolution Department of the Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre, therefore, stressed the need to revise the law to permit the use of guns by security companies in a manner that was well regulated.
He said following the government’s efforts to restructure private security operations in 2002, it was found out that, out of about 320 companies currently operating in the country, about two-thirds of them were not registered by the Ministry of the Interior.
On the allegation that the establishment of private security companies by some politicians could be used for political purposes, Dr Enning described the allegation as “disingenuous”, adding that “we should de-politicise the issue”.
He said people were interested in security not because they wanted to use it for political purposes, but because they were interested in safeguarding their own safety.
Recently, the Minister of State at the Ministry of the Interior, Nana Obiri Boahen, declared the ministry’s resolve to assert its authority over the private security industry.
He announced various measures, including registration of the companies and tracking down those operating without identifiable addresses and outside regulations guiding the industry, to bring the situation under control.
When contacted, Nana Boahen said “the response has been very great”, with many of the companies updating their records and renewing their licences.
He said many of them had also been sending their monthly returns to the ministry, expressing the hope that the situation would further improve.