Adib Saani, a security expert, has hailed the appointment of COP Dr George Akuffo Dampare as acting Inspector General of Police (IGP).
Speaking on The Big Bulletin with Beatrice Adu on Wednesday (21 July) Saani said: “… I stop at checkpoints to engage police officers. One of the biggest problems or challenges a lot of them talk about is leadership. Leadership that doesn’t really care so much about them.
“You have complaints but you cannot talk because there seems to be that silence within the security services. And the outgoing Inspector General of Police wasn’t very popular among the officers.
“So far, [from] the information I have gathered, the most popular person almost all the police officers I have spoken with wish for [is] Kofi Boakye, followed by Dampare to become IGP. At least, it is not Kofi Boakye, but I am glad that it is Dampare,” Saani said.
He said COP Dampare has the competence and fit for the top police job.
“He is young, he is full of exuberance, his credentials are there for all to see,” Saani stressed.
Background
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo announced the appointment on Wednesday. COP Dampare will take over from James Oppong-Boanuh as head of the Ghana Police Service from 1 August 2021.
Oppong-Boanuh has been the head of the Police Service since 14 August 2019, when the president appointed him, in accordance with the constitution of Ghana.
COP Dampare is the director general in charge of administration in the Police Service and a member of the Police Management Board.
Profile of Dampare
Dr Dampare is the youngest acting IGP to be appointed in the Fourth Republic and the eighth youngest since Ghana gained independence. Before this appointment, he was the most senior police officer after the just-retired IGP.
Dr Dampare joined the Ghana Police Service as a constable in December 1990 at the age of 20 and rose through the ranks to become Commissioner of Police (COP) 24 years later at age 44 in 2014, the rank he held until his appointment.
In 1991, on completion of his recruit training, Dampare was adjudged the overall best recruit at the National Police Training School and won all awards except the award for the “Best Marksman”. In 1996, he again emerged the overall best cadet for the 32nd Cadet Officers’ Course at the Ghana Police Academy (formerly Police College) and won all awards, including Excellence in Professional Police Subjects and Excellence in Academic Subjects.
During his 30-year-plus career as a police officer, Dr Dampare has made significant contributions to policing in Ghana and beyond.
At the leadership and management level, he has had the rare privilege of serving as the head of almost every major department, giving him greater insight into the administration of policing in Ghana. Specifically, Dampare has been director general for administration and director general for welfare twice.
He has also served as director general for MTTD, director general for research and planning, director general for operations, director general for ICT, director general for finance and director general for the National Patrol Department (Police Visibility Department).
Other leadership positions Dampare previously held are Commandant of the Police Command and Staff College, Accra Regional Police Commander, Regional Commander for Railways, Ports and Harbours (now the Police Marine Department), Municipal Commander for Cape Coast and chief internal auditor of the Ghana Police Service.
Between 2010 and 2015, under the leadership of two IGPs – Messrs Paul Tawiah Quaye and Mohammed Ahmed Alhassan – Dampare led and co-ordinated the “National Anti-armed Robbery Reward to Informant Initiative“, which led to the arrest and prosecution of many notorious armed robbers across the country.
Fighting robbery
As director general for national operations, Dampare created an efficient system in which fragmented units were consolidated to create effective and complete departments. One example of this was the establishment of an Anti-Armed Robbery Unit (the COMBAT Unit) to fight robbery and other violent crimes aggressively.
He also created the intelligence unit within the National Operations Department, which later informed the creation of a Police Intelligence Department at the national level.
As Accra Regional Police Commander, Dampare introduced an innovative and proactive policing strategy called the “Continuous Stakeholder Engagement Programme”, in which all stakeholders were included and involved in policing the region. For the first time, through this initiative under his leadership, the Ghana Police Service, visited political parties in their offices to engage them.
As director general in charge of welfare, Dampare introduced an innovative social welfare scheme, leading officers from the department to visit the homes of scores of sick and bedridden police officers across Ghana. He also introduced strategic medical interventions to facilitate their wellness.
Still in the area of welfare, Dampare initiated a process in Dodowa and Kasoa to reclaim lands owned and paid for by police officers. The matter had become a national security threat, as many officers were angered by the failure of the police administration leadership to intervene in the situation, which had lasted for close to a decade.
In 2013, under the leadership of the then IGP, Mohammed Ahmed Alhassan, Dampare led a team of officers, working day and night, to restructure the Armoured Car Squadron (ACS) Unit into the Formed Police Unit (FPU) within a record ten weeks. This task had remained impossible for over 15 years. The FPU has become one of the units undertaking internal police operations and international peacekeeping missions under the United Nations and African Union.
As director general of the National Patrol Department (Police Visibility Department) and under the leadership of the then IGP, Mohammed Ahmed Alhassan, he supervised the implementation of the novel “Police Visibility” programme which led to a palpable presence of police personnel at most intersections and in most communities in Ghana.
Again, during the implementation of the vision of IGP Mohammed Ahmed Alhassan for the creation of the Police Service Command and Staff College in Winneba and the Police Service Public Safety Training School in Pwalugu, Dampare led the technical teams which ensured the full operationalisation of the two specialist training institutions.
Dr Dampare is credited with the idea which led to the establishment of the office of the Armourer General, which serves as the central accounting point for arms and ammunitions within the Ghana Police Service. He also established the Service Enquiry Monitoring Unit, which has responsibility for managing the GPS disciplinary system.
As the co-ordinator of the National Inter-Ministerial Task Force on the 2007 Ghana Floods, which was under the overall leadership of Dr Mrs Mary Chinery-Hesse (then chief advisor to President John Agyekum Kufuor), Dr Dampare led a team within a seven-month period to develop and implement a national disaster management model, which brought together all United Nations agencies, the Red Cross, civil society and other organisations to manage the disaster response successfully.
In the finance department, Dampare led a police technical implementation team to work with the Fair Wages and Salaries Commission to migrate the Police Service on to the Single Spine Salary Structure – the first institution in Ghana to complete the migration successfully.
Still as director general for finance, Dampare introduced the payment of recruits’ allowances through banks by getting them bank accounts as well as ATM cards. He also engaged the banks and got them to build ATMs at the police training schools at no cost to the government.
Under the visionary instruction of the then IGP, Paul Tawiah Quaye, Dampare also led a team to establish the GPS’s Procurement Unit and ensure full implementation of the Procurement Act. He introduced cost-saving measures in repairing service vehicles and the use of hotel accommodation rather than maintenance of property for use by visiting service personnel.
Dampare led a team of officers to use mostly donations from the private sector to give a facelift to Police Headquarters in Accra, constructing a public affairs building, the Integrity Square, the Police Fitness and Social Centre and a helipad. The CID headquarters building was also refurbished under his leadership.
Days as regional commander
As Accra Regional Commander, Dampare raised sufficient capital from the private sector to complete a new office complex and reroofed 90% of all office buildings at Regional Headquarters, which had been in a deplorable state for years.
During his policing career, Dr Dampare has undertaken numerous law-enforcement courses at the tactical, operational, strategic leadership and management levels, making him an all-round police officer with the skills and competencies required, commensurate with his rank.
Aside from his policing, Dr Dampare previously worked as a research fellow and lecturer at King’s College London, University of London. He also lectured at the University of Cape Coast (UCC), Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA), Regent University College and Data Link University College. He is also one of the pioneer lecturers in the Business School of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), Kumasi.
Having passed his GCE Ordinary and Advanced level examinations as a private candidate in 1989 and 1992, respectively, Dr Dampare proceeded to study accountancy and became a chartered accountant in 1996 at age 25. He also holds a doctorate-level degree in finance and management from King’s College London, University of London, and two MSc degrees with distinction – in accounting and finance from London South Bank University in the UK and in business systems analysis and design from City University of London, also in the UK.
Dr Dampare holds a certificate in high impact leadership from the Institute for Sustainability Leadership of the University of Cambridge, UK, and a certificate in leadership and management from the Aresty Institute of Executive Education at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania in the United States of America.
He is a member of a number professional associations, including the International Association of Chiefs of Police (ICP), International Association of Crime Analysts (IACA), Institute of Chartered Accountants (ICA) and Ghana Journalists Association (GJA).
He has served and continues to serve on several boards, among them the governing board of the Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO), the council of Data Link University College, the Police Central Disciplinary Board and the Pumpkins Foundation Board (a philanthropic organisation for underprivileged children, including those with autism).
He is married to Anita and has six children.
Fred Dzakpata
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