Musa Says CCTVs Will Make a ‘Big Splash’ in Belize

Besides the upcoming leadership change in the police department, Minister of Home Affairs Kareem Musa announced an exciting new initiative: the installation of one thousand CCTV cameras across the country. We asked Musa about these plans and the need for more officers in the force. Here’s what he had to say.

 

Kareem Musa, Minister of Home Affairs

“Yes absolutely. The biggest splash, so to speak for this year is going to be the introduction of one thousand CCTV cameras. We are already set up here in the Belmopan area. I think when you came into Belmopan, you might have seen them at the roundabouts. We are establishing a headquarters here in Belmopan for the camera room, along with BTL, they will be the service providers. And so we’re growing exponentially, I think by some four hundred percent in the number of cameras. I think currently we have around two hundred or so cameras. And we just want to grow in terms of our use of these assets, these tools like innovation and technology because we have seen where a bulk of our crimes are solved with cameras, whether it is these CCTV cameras or private cameras on establishments, they’re of great use in solving crimes. And so that is going to be the big splash for this year.”

 

Britney Gordon

“Is there any sort of movement to acquire new officers? Because I know that the department is stretched quite thin right now.”

 

Kareem Musa

“Yeah, so we, I wouldn’t say we’re stretched thin. I think we are reaching close to the levels we were at in 2015, 2016, around two thousand six hundred  officers. We did have a lot of attrition over the last. Early on five years ago, but we are now growing those numbers. We have a recruit squad that will be graduating sometime in June of this year, and then we could look forward after that to maybe enlisting additional officers. As we only have capacity here at the training academy for two hundred twenty-five officers at any given time, and that’s a six month training. So it can’t be that we grow one thousand every single year. We actually have to do it incrementally.”