By Prince J Musa in Kenema
The Independent Police Complaint Board (IPCB) together with UNDP have conducted a training to build the capacity of the Sierra Leone Police, Fire Force, Correctional Service ,Civil Society and Inter-Religious bodies on the implementation of the Rwanda Security guidelines. The training took place in Kenema on Monday 23 August 2021.
The Programme and Communication Officer for IPCB, Amodu Femoh Sesay said the training captured Police mode of detention and how they could improve on their job, referencing the 2014 Africa Commission on human and people’s rights report which revealed that the manner in which some police and correctional service officers in the continent carry out their work do their jobs fall short of best practices.
He said it’s on that note that the guidelines were developed and therefore called on African countries including Sierra Leone to domesticate those provisions stated in the guidelines. According to Sesay, the board with the responsibility to investigate the Police, and at the same time protect well- performing officers, saw the need to implement the Rwanda guidelines.
“There are a lot of allegations of Police brutality and illegal arrests… including excessive use of force,” he said.
Sesay believed the process will further alert government officials and the senior management of the Police about the presence of such a document that will guide and help transform the operations of the Police in the country.
He said the national law states that Police can detain somebody for three days for minor crimes while for serious crimes, one can be detained for ten days but cited the Rwanda guidelines which state that detention period should be within two days or forty- eight hours during which it is expected that all the necessary evidence to charge that person to court would have been made available.
He added that the training is expected to change the old narrative of the work of the Police and that the IPCB’s focus is to ensure that politicians allow the Police to do the job expected of them without any interference.
In his statement, Assistant Superintendent of Police, Alhaji Foday Tarawally said the training is significant and timely as it prepares personnel to be conversant with the guidelines and principles within the law.
He said it has exposed their excesses and helped them to learn a lot about how professional they should be in dealing with matters that have to do with people and hoped that after the exercise, the trainees will go back and cascade the knowledge they have acquired to their colleagues that were not fortunate to attend the session.
A civil society activist, Edward Foday Kai said the public has over the years criticized the conduct of the Police especially in exerting disproportionate force when dealing with civilians, sometimes even in minor disputes.
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