Police target international policing standards
Pini Bothoko | Wednesday June 29, 2022 16:28
The Police have since said they have not made a mistake. They said it is a statement of intent to elevate BPS.
For years the BPS has been hiring police constables with Botswana General Certificate of Secondary Education (BGCSE) qualification but this time around their advertisement is clear they want people across various education levels including degree, diploma, and certificate just to mention but a few.
BPS is currently looking for police constables with masters’ degree in education and evaluation and research and development.
For entry, the service is looking for candidates with degree in bioinformatics, biology, chemistry or any natural science, geology, electronic engineering, physics, biomedical science, anthropology, radiology, medical laboratory management, quantity surveying , statistics just to name but a few.
Quizzed why they had advertised the many expertise, BPS Public Relations Officer, Senior Superintendent Near Bagali said their intention is to match international policing standards by hiring officers with rare fields of study which are important for the service. Bagali also said their other plan is to be able to analyse issues in detail with such expertise and match international policing standards.
“The service cannot find such expertise internally hence the advertisement. We have a big forensic laboratory in Gaborone which has been running with limited staff hence the need for that expertise. Those fields has been there but operating with small staff so we just want to increase manpower,” Bagali said.
He stated regardless of their qualifications they need all of them to undergo training at Police College and learn policing from the scratch because that is their entry level. Bagali said such fields were advertised because the service has been struggling to operate the laboratory with slim manpower.
“We want them to undergo training before joining the service because we want them to be able to do policing duties other than their area of expertise. We used to have post of police officer cadet which officers were hired from the rank of inspector with an entry level of degree but it was faced out with time,” he said.
Bagali is hopeful that the required expertise will improve the service and be able to match standards of international policing. He added that he is hopeful that they would be able to investigate and analyse cases in detail.