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A NUMBER of Junior Police Officers from the Motor Traffic and Transport Department (MTTD) of the Ghana Police Service have alleged in separate interviews with the DAILY HERITAGE that some of them take bribes from drivers on the road because they have been directed by their superiors to do so.

The junior officers said most of their officers demand huge sums of money from them immediately they return from road checks and sometimes reprimand them for failing to ‘bring home better sales.’

“An officer who continues to bring meager revenue risk being withdrawn from road checks,” a junior officer told the paper in an interview.

But, the Director of Police Public Affairs of the Ghana Police Service, DSP Cephas Arthur, has rubbished the allegation and described it as a fabrication.

“There is nothing like that, what you are saying is that the boys are saying that they take bribes. Whoever told you the story it means that he is taking money so come and report that he is taking money.”He stated in an interview with the paper.

DSP Arthur said “I don’t know about any boss giving junior officers targets. It is not true. It means the person himself has confessed that he has been taking money and that is against the rules and regulations of the service and you can come and report them for extortion.

“There is nothing like that, no boss sendspersonnel and tells them that go and collect money for me, I don’t know, we don’t have any officer doing that. The work we do is that we don’t go and sell to bring money home; neither do we make any product for wholesale, what we do is to render service and at the end of the month the government pays us.

“I don’t see why anybody will go out and extort money from drivers and even in the course of doing that he says it is his boss who sent him to bring money back; you need to come and report such a person,” he advised.

Police investigator

A junior police investigator, on his part, told the paper that his station and crime officers and sometimes his commander put pressure on him to demand bribes from either suspects or complainants in some cases.

He said, in a situation like that there is no option than to please the superioror risk being accused of “disobeying orders.In some cases we are told to demand a particular amount of money.” He stated.

According to the officers, some avoidable road accidents could be blamed on them since they normally failto act professionally due to financial consideration.

Most of the senior officers who were contacted refused to comment on the issue, but a few who reacted refuted the allegations and insisted to know the identity of those junior officers who made the allegations.

A senior officer at the police headquarters urged the public to report any officer who demands bribe to the authorities for appropriate redress.