Sierra Leone launches community-policing effort in Kambia district

With the World Health Organization recently announcing that Sierra Leone's Ebola epidemic is over, a Community Policing Project has been instituted in the Kambia border district.

“Police cannot be an effective and modern police force if we do not work closely with the community," Sierra Leone Inspector General of Police (IGP) Francis Munu said. "The Sierra Leone Police is a modern police force seeking to provide excellent professional service to the country and your communities. Policing is a service. It is a service to the country. We will ensure that we provide you with the best professional service.”

The Community Policing Project is being supported through the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) with funding from Japan's government.

Also included in the project will be measures to increase the strength of Sierra Leone's border-management system and provide training and logistics for community police services.

“The Sierra Leone Police has already been implementing the concept of local-needs policing, specifically in cooperation with the Local Policing Partnership Board, Area Policing Partnership Committee, Zonal Policing Partnership Committee and Community Safety Volunteers, among others," UNDP Police Adviser Mona Nordberg said. “(The project is an) additional step toward enhancing trust and partnership between the police and the communities, and also includes the communities in improving security and safety and to prevent and fight crime.”

UNDP Team Leader for Governance Annette Nalwoga agreed.

“As Sierra Leone works toward recovering better from the Ebola epidemic, UNDP is confident that community policing will play a significant role in bringing communities together and enhance peace after the Ebola epidemic, where conflict with security forces and communities were inevitable, especially where restrictions of movements of people and quarantining of homes and communities proved difficult as the country was grappling to stem the spread of the virus,” Nalwoga said.