<<Print>>

Crime may soon not be an attractive venture for certain people in the country if what the police are saying is anything to go by.

It follows the outdooring of a new device that can track the movement of every Ghanaian no matter where one may be.

The Biometric Verification Machine which comes with Mobile Device Management Software was outdoored Friday evening by Vice President Bawumia at the Police Headquarters in Accra.

The $2million device was developed and donated by the Margins ID Group, a leading local company that specialises in identification and documentation systems as its corporate social responsibility to the Police Service.

Vice President Bawumia who performed the launch of the device described it as a valuable weapon which according to him if successfully delivered and connected to the integrated database, will help to “leapfrog many other advanced countries’’ in the area of surveillance and crime fighting.”

‘’If you’re going to benefit from digitalisation, you cannot allow the system that you’re setting up to sit in silos. You have to integrate the systems so that you can benefit from knowing if you’re in a crime database and you integrate it with the national ID database, you can tell when you meet somebody who is on the crime database that this person is either a criminal or someone who is wanted. So the issue of integration of the police database with the NIA database, it is very important”, he enphasised.

With these devices (mobile device software), he explained “it is very important that when the Police meet you on the street they can tell who you are with or without your Ghana card.”

“They can tell if you’re wanted or not. They can tell whether the vehicle you are driving is registered or not because you are linking the data bases. So it is a valuable weapon in the fight against crime and the protection of the public and the safety of the public’, he said whilst beaming with broad smiles.

The Vice President who has been leading the Akufo-Addo-led NPP government’s digitalisation drive, described the donation as the beginning.

That, he said was because “we are going to see more and more devices in the hands of police officers across the country so that policing will be very effective in Ghana and this is something that Ghana and the Ghana Police Service will be proud of because we are moving into an area where in fact many advanced countries are still trying to get into that area’’.

On his part, Moses Baiden, Chairman of the Margins, who are partnering the National Identification Authority (NIA) in the production of the National ID cards (Ghana Card) said the donation was to complement the work of the National Identification Authority, plus an added advantage.

‘’We support the Police because we can see the dynamism within which the Police has increased visibility and with the encouragement of the Vice President, we are ready to support the police in their digitisation agenda as part of the national digitisation policy.

“The Police protect us all, so our corporate social responsibility objective is to help the police continue on the dynamic trail on which they are. HaBing done a tour of the Police facility, I’m even more convinced that this donation is in the right direction. Our donation is an extension of the national identification infrastructure which today has over 17.5 million people on their database both foreigners and nationals who are the center of the digitization agenda because it allows everybody to know people who are accessing resources and who they claim they are’’, he explained.

Apart from that, he said “the technology is also expected to help put surveillance on suspects wherever they may be in the country.
‘’The Police in this sense will be able to identify people in real time with the device management platform with or without the Ghana card in whatever part of Ghana that they are.”

“They can also in real time tell people who are on a watch list for whatever reason of crime and will be able to bring digitization to bare in protecting the citizens’’, he said to the applause of the gathering.

Margins ID Group has since donated (100) one hundred of the mobile device software to the Ghana Police Service with a promise to donate more going forward.

On his part, the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Dr. Akufo Dampare who is leading a transformation of the Police Service expressed optimism about how the device it will help the police as part of the police agenda.

‘’We can’t wait to use them because we know it will transform Policing in Ghana’’, he said with excitement.