KAMPALA — Yumbe, Kumi and Lira policing districts have been ranked best performers and awarded with accolades, bulls and money by this Inspector General of Police Martin’s Okoth Ochola.
Speaking to partners, police commanders and the media, on Monday August 19 in an event held at Police headquarters in Naguru, Mr. Ochola said that the exercise will serve as a wakeup call to unit commanders and supervisors to strive and improve delivery of policing services.
“Giving due recognition to outstanding officers, stations and partners who have earned the respect and admiration of the communities they serve would serve a great deal in creating a favorable public mindset for the country’s law enforcement by offsetting the negative views about the UPF and promoting what is truly representative of the UPF as an organization, that despite its inadequacies in terms of manpower and logistical resources, it continues to serve best,” the excited IGP said.
On the flip side, Lira, Omoro districts and Kira Division were named as the worst performing policing areas in the country in the year ending 2018.
Their poor performance is attributed to failure to observe the 24-hour rule for suspects to appear in court and bad reception of clients.
Similarly, individuals, organization, and communities that were identified and recommended in 2018 include SCOUL – For renovation of Lugazi Police Station and construction CFPU offices at Lugazi Police Station, Kiwanga Community – For construction of Kiwanga Police Post in Goma Division, Mukono municipality and BMK – For construction of Wampewo Police Post.
Other include Ziroobwe Community – For renovation of Ziroobwe Police Station in Ziroobwe Town, Luwero District, Nakivubo Mews Community– For construction of Nakivubo Mews Police Post amd Ngoobe Community – For construction of Ngoobe Police Post – Kajjansi among others.
The IGP noted that police still has a number of challenges in the execution dutes under-funding, capacity gaps in terms of personnel strengths and training, welfare, indiscipline by some officers, corrupt practices, human rights violations.
He however, vowed to improve welfare, strengthening the disciplinary court systems and rewarding performance which is a yard stick for enhancing professionalism, motivating personnel and consequently improving service delivery.
“I am confident that this will add to the already ongoing efforts in energizing our field commanders in the fight against crime and hopefully we shall register better performance in the year 2019,” he said.
But rights defenders believe the police performance in relation to the public is still lacking in spite of the rewards.
