Establish a trustworthy police service, Akufo-Addo charges IGP

President Akufo-Addo has charged the 23rd Inspector General of Police (IGP) of Ghana, George Akuffo Dampare, to build a police service that will be able to maintain the trust of the Ghanaian people.

The president charged the IGP with this responsibility after he administered the oaths of allegiance, office and secrecy to Dampare in the Banquet Hall of Jubilee House on Thursday (7 October 2021), at the first formal swearing-in ceremony for an IGP since the start of the Akufo-Addo presidency.

President Akufo-Addo said the most important things for any nation are its peace, the safety of its people and the preservation of its territorial integrity. A trusted police service, he said, is critical to guarantee the nation’s ability to enjoy these things.

“It is often said that the public is the police, and the police is the public,” the president said. “The citizenry can only have confidence in the police service when its members are seen to be honest and enforce the law without fear or favour.

“Your task as IGP during your term of office is to establish a service that maintains the trust of the citizenry,” President Akufo-Addo said.

“It is in everybody’s interest that the Police Service conducts itself as a principled, credible instrument of accomplishing the executive’s duty to maintain law and order in the state.”

An apolitical service

Touching on the need for an independent and apolitical police force, President Akufo-Addo noted: “Governments in our body politic have term limits.”

As such, the president said, “In a multiparty democracy, parties win and lose power,” and it “is good for the health of the nation that this should be so”.

“This is why the Police Service under your leadership [that of George Akuffo Dampare] should not tie its well-being or otherwise to the fortunes of the ruling party of the day.

“As president, and together with you as Inspector General of Police, we need to co-operate to ensure that the Police Service is left to focus on its core mandate and not to be an appendage of the ruling party,” he said.

Executive support

Expressing his confidence in the new IGP, President Akufo-Addo described Dampare’s two months in office as acting IGP as eventful.

Dr Dampare’s performance had left him with very little choice with regard to his confirmation as IGP, he said.

“I believe strongly that in you, we can help promote the development of the nation, governed by the rule of law and respect for human rights with the police being on the front line of this endeavour,” President Akufo-Addo declared.

Public acceptance

President Akufo-Addo’s appointment on 21 July 2021 of the then Commissioner of Police George Akuffo Dampare as the acting IGP to replace the immediate past Inspector General, James Oppong-Boanuh, was widely embraced by Ghanaians.

The president’s directive has been described by a cross-section of Ghanaians as a good decision that will go a long way to improve the Ghana Police Service, considering the rich experience that Dampare brings to his new job.

Social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram and Twitter were awash with congratulatory messages for the newly named acting IGP as members of the public wished him well in his new role.

The IGP

In his acceptance speech, the IGP, George Akuffo Dampare, registered his appreciation to President Akufo-Addo and Vice-President Mahamudu Bawumia for the confidence reposed in him by nominating him and subsequently appointing him to the office of Inspector General of Police.

He added that he will work together with the men and women of the Ghana Police Service to make it a first-rate institution.

“Our vision is to become a world-class police institution. Mr President, we are poised, we are focused to attain that,” said IGP Dampare.

“We know it is not going to be easy, but my colleagues and I have made up our mind that even if we are unable to take it to that destination, we at this time will position the organisation towards that destination, such that there will be no turning back.”

Profile of Dampare

George Akuffo 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 (GPS) 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 44 in 2014. This was the rank he held until his latest appointment.

In 1991, on completion of his recruit training course, Dr Dampare was adjudged the overall best recruit at the National Police Training School and won all awards except the one for best marksman.

Again in 1996, he emerged the overall best cadet on the 32nd Cadet Officers’ Course at the Ghana Police Academy (formerly the Police College), winning all awards, including Excellence in Professional Police Subjects and Excellence in Academic Subjects.

Over his 30-year-plus career as a police officer, Dr Dampare has made significant contributions to law enforcement in Ghana and beyond.

At the leadership and management level, he has had the rare privilege of serving as director general of almost every major department, giving him deep insights into the administration of policing in Ghana.

Specifically, Dr Dampare has been director general for administration and director general for welfare twice. He has also served as director general of the Motor Traffic and Transport Department (MTTD), director general of research and planning, director general of operations, director general of ICT, director general in charge of finance and director general of the National Patrol Department (Police Visibility Department).

Other leadership positions he 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 GPS.

Between 2010 and 2015, under the leadership of two previous IGPs – Messrs Paul Tawiah Quaye and Mohammed Ahmed Alhassan – Dampare led and co-ordinated the National Anti-Armed Robbery Reward to Informant Initiative. This led to the arrest and prosecution of many notorious armed robbers across the country.

Fighting robbery

As director general in charge of national operations, Dr Dampare created an efficient system in which fragmented units were consolidated to create effective and complete departments, such as the 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 involved to assist in policing the region. For the first time, through this initiative under his leadership, the Ghana Police Service visited political parties at their offices to engage with them.

As director general in charge of welfare, Dr Dampare introduced an innovative social welfare scheme in which he led officers from the department to visit the homes of scores of sick and bedridden police officers across the country. He also introduced strategic medical interventions to facilitate the officers’ good health.

Still at 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 at the time were angered by the police administration leadership’s failure to intervene in the problem, which had festered for close to a decade.

In 2013, under the leadership of the then IGP Alhassan, Dr 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 the record time of ten weeks. The task had seemed impossible for over 15 years.

The FPU has become one of the police units undertaking internal policing operations and international peacekeeping missions under the banner of the United Nations and African Union.

As the director general of the National Patrol Department (Police Visibility Department) and under the leadership of the then IGP, Mohammed Ahmed Alhassan, Dampare supervised the implementation of a novel police visibility programme, which led to a presence of service personnel at most intersections and in most communities across Ghana.

Again, during the implementation of the vision of the then 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, Dr Dampare was the leader of the technical teams which ensured the full operationalisation of the two specialist training institutions.

Dampare is credited with the idea that led to the establishment of the Office of the Armourer General, which serves as the central accounting point for arms and ammunition within the Ghana Police Service. He is also seen as responsible for the establishment of the Service Enquiry Monitoring Unit (SEMU), with responsibility for managing the GPS disciplinary system.

As co-ordinator of the National Inter-Ministerial Task Force on the 2007 Ghana Floods, which was under the overall leadership of Dr Mary Chinery-Hesse (the then chief advisor to President John Agyekum Kufuor), Dr Dampare led a team to develop and implement, within a seven-month period, a national disaster management model. This brought together all United Nations agencies, the Red Cross and civil society organisations to manage the disaster successfully.

During his period of service as director general in charge of finance, Dampare led a 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 the country to complete the migration successfully.

In the same role, Dampare introduced payment of recruits’ allowances through the banks, getting them bank accounts as well as ATM cards. He also engaged the banks and got them to instal ATMs at the police training schools at no cost to the government.

Crucially, responding to instructions from the then IGP, Paul Tawiah Quaye, Dampare led a team to establish the Procurement Unit of the GPS and ensure full implementation of the Procurement Act. He introduced cost-saving measures for the repair of service vehicles and use of hotel accommodation, among others.

Dampare led a team of officers to use contributions, mainly in the form of donations from the private sector, to give a facelift to the Police Headquarters by constructing a public affairs building, Integrity Square, the Police Fitness and Social Centre and a helipad. The CID Headquarters building was also refurbished under his leadership.

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 the regional headquarters, which had been in a deplorable state for years.

During his policing career, Dr Dampare has undertaken numerous law-enforcement courses at tactical, operational, strategic leadership and management levels, making him an all-round police officer with the skills and competencies commensurate with his rank.

Aside from policing, Dr Dampare has worked as a research fellow and lecturer at King’s College London, University of London. He has also lectured at the University of Cape Coast, the Ghana Institute of Management and Public Administration (GIMPA), Regent University College and Data Link University College.

He was one of the pioneer lecturers at the Business School of the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST) in Kumasi.

Having passed the GCE Ordinary (1989) and Advanced-level (1992) examinations as a private candidate, Dampare proceeded to study accountancy and qualified as a chartered accountant in 1996 at the age of 25.

He also holds Master of Science degrees with distinction – in accounting and finance from London South Bank University and in business systems analysis and design from City University of London, both in the UK – as well as a PhD degree in finance and management from King’s College London.

Dr Dampare also holds certificates in high-impact leadership from the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership in the UK and in leadership and management from the Aresty Institute of Executive Education at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, US.

He is a member of a number of professional associations, including the International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP), the International Association of Crime Analysts (IACA), the Institute of Chartered Accountants (Ghana) (ICAG) and the Ghana Journalists Association.

Dr Dampare has served on many boards and continues to do so. These include the governing board of the Economic and Organised Crime Office (EOCO), Data Link University College Council, the Police Central Disciplinary Board and the Pumpkins Foundation Board (a philanthropic organisation for underprivileged children, including those with autism).

Wilberforce Asare

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