New Police Stations and Police Recruits Incoming

The Belize Police Department is planning to construct police stations in several communities across the country as part of its national crime fighting efforts. The department also plans to add an additional six hundred officers to the force.  Today, ComPol Williams revealed that a Cabinet paper has been drafted to this end and will soon be presented to the Minister of Home Affairs.

 

Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police

“Every time you hear the news and you listen to the discourse on social media you get the impression that nobody likes police. The demand for policing has increased exponentially. Everywhere we go people are asking for police presence in their respective communities.  We have a number of stations that we have to construct. We are looking at a police station in Trial Farm, a police station in Kontiki, a police station in Santa Elena, police station in Cotton Tree, police station in Teakettle. These are police stations all in the pipeline for construction. With these police stations will come the need for more police officers. We have put together a Cabinet paper that we will present to our minister asking the government to approve the recruitment of another two hundred police officers. Currently the police department’s strength is at two thousand four hundred. We want to take that to three thousand minimal. And with that we want to make sure we can accommodate the policing demands in our country.  When we look at the police population compared to the country population, we are less than one percent of the country population and so certainly it’s inadequate and there is a need to have more police officers.”