No place for brute force and ignorance- Pres. Ali tells Police Conference

President Irfaan Ali on Thursday warned the Guyana Police Force that there is no place for brute force and ignorance in the organization.

The president was at the time delivering the feature address at the Annual Officers Conference being held under the theme “Promoting Improvement of Public Trust and Confidence, Maintenance Safety and Security through Competence, Professionalism and Partnership”

President Ali has also called for there to be a change of the police culture of shouting at persons and raising their voices when dealing with situations at stations.

But most of the president’s comments at the officers’ conference, were aimed at commending the force for its successes over the last year and assured that the government has been pleased with the output of the organization.

President Ali has also commended the operational capacity of the force which is headed by Deputy Commissioner of Operations Clifton Hicken and the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) headed by Crime Chief Wendell Blanhum.

According to the Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces, he looks forward to a long term plan from the Guyana Police Force to improve its public image.

The President said the PR Unit of the force should not be a reactive one, but one that is proactive and which continuously promote the force and also put out educational material for members of the public.

Ali commended the force for its intelligence-led police operations which have resulted in successes that the government is pleased about.

The work the police has been doing in communities is one that also has the government smiling and the president has now publicly made it known that government will support the work the police do with communities.

Coordination between the joint services has been a GREAT Improvement which continues to benefit all agencies involved and urged the heads to keep up the collaboration.

When it comes to the judiciary and the police collaboration, President Ali urged that the two sides have a closed-door frank discussion that could see the two arms working together as against public debate on the weaknesses of either side.

The president has suggested that the police look at the concept of burden-sharing. This will be in cases of persons who are driving under the influence of alcohol, the persons serving the alcohol are also likely to be called in for questioning when someone they served ‘excess’ alcohol to get into an accident or something else.