The police administration, in partnership with the Youth Employment Agency (YEA), is to recruit about 36,000 youth under the Community Protection Officer (CPO) module.
The CPOs when employed, will be deployed into the various communities to help fight and prevent crime.
At the launch of the module at the police headquarters in Accra, the Deputy Chief Executive Officer of YEA, Bashiru Ibrahim, said the Community Protection Officers were expected to be trained and deployed from August to November this year.
He said this community safety and security innovation would help reduce unemployment among the youth in the country.
He said a total of 5,000 youth were also expected to be employed by other security agencies, including the Ghana National Fire Service, Ghana Prisons Service and Immigration Service by the end of this year.
“The agency also has acquired a provident fund to organize entrepreneurship skills for the recruits to establish themselves after completion of their service,” Mr Ibrahim said.
Touching on the issue of ghost names, the YEA deputy chief executive officer averred that the agency had recruited over 600 monitoring and evaluation officers to monitor the activities of the recruits.
He said the Auditor General is also playing its part and had directed the agency to do pre-auditing of its payroll.
The Director General in-charge of National Patrols Department of the Ghana Police Service, DCOP Akuribah Yaagy, in an address said this partnership is expected to activate the consciousness of Ghanaians in crime prevention, social justice and community welfare.
DCOP Akuribah said the police service was introducing a more professional, cost-effective and community friendly model of policing where state resource budgeted for security can be shared to minimize the frustration of the youth on employment.
“Civilians’ oversight body will be constituted for all 6,000 electoral areas for effective monitoring of the recruits,” he disclosed.
DCOP Yaagy said security is a shared responsibility hence, society has a part to play in crime combat.
Senior police officers who graced the occasion were Director General in-charge of Private Security, DCOP Paul Awini; Director of Community Police Department, ACP Habiba Twumasi-Sarpong and Director General, Police Public Affairs Department, ACP David Eklu.
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