By Ramatoulie Jawo
The Gambia Police Force (GPF) on Friday concluded a week training on human rights and hate crime for 30 officers at the GPFCCU in Kanifing.
The training was facilitated by the Turkish National Police Force in partnership with the Gambia Police Force (GPF).
The purpose of the training is to build your capacity and expertise for effective mitigation of hate speech as a crime and its associated threats, as well as human rights.
Assistant Inspector General of Police (AIG) Admin, Ebrima Bah said the demands for policing in the Gambia are changing in complexity and diversity, especially with the advent of the newfound democracy.
“Those monitoring closely the crime trend would without doubt agree with me that inflammatory hate speech is widespread in the Gambia, especially through the social media and other electronic platforms,” he said.
Bah added that the phenomenon most of the time generates massive resentments with the tendency to cause trauma and panic in society.
“This trend is particularly alarming from the security point of view, because it is surfacing at a high rate and has the potential consequence of sparking preventable conflict and violence in the country,” Bah observed.
Mustafa Yayla, the lead trained thanked the participants for their cooperation during the course period and expressed hope that they would share the knowledge with their colleagues.
Ken Mendy, Deputy Police Commissioner, and a participant on behalf of the trainees, applauded the GPF for giving them the opportunity and thanked the trainers for their excellent deliberation during the training.
Supt. Foday Fofana recognized the strength of the training and the progress made in building the capacity of officers; saying, “the training will enable the GPF in protecting human rights.”