The Central Regional Police Command has said it will set up tent cities in the Kasoa enclave to increase police patrols and visibility as part of strategies to combat increasing criminal activities in the area.
Already, police surveillance has established where these tent cities will be set up.
These “tent cities”, which will serve as host shelters for policemen at strategically designated parts of the Kasoa area, are expected to help bring policemen closer to the communities to improve surveillance and possibly reduce the crime rate in the area.
The Central Regional Police Commander, Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCOP) Habiba Twumasi-Sarpong, at a press briefing in Cape Coast last Tuesday, said as a first step, the police hierarchy had augmented the number of personnel in the two Kasoa divisions to help fight crime effectively.
She said the police were also working with chiefs in the area to start watch committees in the communities to augment the efforts of the police.
DCOP Twumasi-Sarpong further stated that media education and community engagements were ongoing within the enclave to ensure stakeholder collaboration for effective policing.
She further intimated that the police command, with support from the police hierarchy, had cultivated more informants to help the police gather information in their effort to reduce crime.
DCOP Twumasi-Sarpong indicated that those measures had already led to the arrest of a suspect, Asare, who had been implicated in the killing of a businessman, Mr Stephen Entsi, who was going to meet a business partner when he was robbed, shot and killed by unidentified assailants on motorbikes.
DCOP Twumasi-Sarpong said on April 19, 2021, the Kasoa Divisional Police Command, acting on intelligence, arrested the suspect from his hideout at Buduburam for his suspected involvement in Entsi’s killing.
In another development, she said, the Criminal Investigations Department of the Kasoa Command, at 9 a.m. on April 20, 2021, arrested a suspect, Kofi Appiah, alias Aboagye Dacosta, at his hideout at the Kasoa Estates Junction for a number of criminal activities in which he was involved.
Kasoa and its environs have been in the news for their high crime rate. A former Central Regional Minister, Mr. Kwamena Duncan, had, on several occasions, cited the area as the region’s security problem.
DCOP Twumasi-Sarpong assured residents of Kasoa and its environs that the police were working hard to safeguard the peace and security of residents of the area.
She also appealed to them to support the police especially with information on crimes to ensure improved security in the area.