People-friendly Police Stations - Am I Dreaming?
It is like a dream come true! Something that no Malaysian in his right mind would have thought possible. Yet it looks like an attempt is being made to make police stations people-friendly! Not only that, they are going to become one-stop centres. So lodging police reports will no longer be a hassle as the police are turning their 148 district police stations nationwide into one-stop centres, having the ambience of commercial banks.
Currently 17 stations, among them Dang Wangi, Sentul and Cheras here and those in Shah Alam, Klang, Kajang and the main stations in other states are being turned into one-stop-centres under an RM8.5 million project, which is expected to be fully completed by the end of the year.
Federal Police Director of Management Datuk Mohd Amir Sulaiman said the centres would bring much needed convenience to the public and is part of the recommendations outlined by the Royal Commission To Enhance The Operations and Management of the Police and the force's own Five-year Action Plan.
"This concept will bring an efficient delivery system. It will also reduce time spent in a police station with a computerised police reporting system (PRS) and reduce bureaucracy so that our clients (the public) are happy," he said when met by reporters here Thursday.
He said the public could have full access to police officers under the new concept as investigating officers (IOs)would be seated in a special corner at these centres so that they can readily serve the public.
"We will try our best to fulfil the concept. It is not easy, for example a specialist in a hospital sees at the most 10 patients in a day, but an IO will receive reports as many as they come, sometimes as high as 40 cases a day. That is something very taxing but we will try and get more men," he said.
Mohd Amir said the refurbishment of the remaining 131 district police offices would be done in stages and that 837 more stations in not so busy areas would be done later. He said with the new concept, the public can expect police stations to be more people friendly, which would further help the force to strive for greater excellence. "If it is a people friendly station, the public will be eager to come. It will be just like going to the bank for a business transaction," he said.
Mohd Amir also said that the PRS, a computerised reporting system wherea complainants can type their reports straight onto computers, had been a major success for the force. "Currently, police stations in the west coast of the peninsula have been equipped with the system. Now, we are implementing it in the east coast areas and later extend it to Sabah and Sarawak," he said.
The PRS system had proven to reduce reporting time, improve the documentation of crime index statistics and also help stations nationwide to exchange information on criminals in a fast and accurate manner, he said. "That is why we are focusing on IT (information technology) now. We want to be paperless one day, get rid of documentation which slow down our procedures. With one click you can get complete statistics of a specific crime nationwide," Mohd Amir added.
**** If it works and I'm sure it will if the staff do their job properly, police stations won't be for long the place of fear that many consider it as. However one must be cautious as time and again we've seen that despite the best of intentions old habits die hard and things slowly get back to the bad old ways. Hopefully this time around there will be unqualified success. All the best to the cops.
Currently 17 stations, among them Dang Wangi, Sentul and Cheras here and those in Shah Alam, Klang, Kajang and the main stations in other states are being turned into one-stop-centres under an RM8.5 million project, which is expected to be fully completed by the end of the year.
Federal Police Director of Management Datuk Mohd Amir Sulaiman said the centres would bring much needed convenience to the public and is part of the recommendations outlined by the Royal Commission To Enhance The Operations and Management of the Police and the force's own Five-year Action Plan.
"This concept will bring an efficient delivery system. It will also reduce time spent in a police station with a computerised police reporting system (PRS) and reduce bureaucracy so that our clients (the public) are happy," he said when met by reporters here Thursday.
He said the public could have full access to police officers under the new concept as investigating officers (IOs)would be seated in a special corner at these centres so that they can readily serve the public.
"We will try our best to fulfil the concept. It is not easy, for example a specialist in a hospital sees at the most 10 patients in a day, but an IO will receive reports as many as they come, sometimes as high as 40 cases a day. That is something very taxing but we will try and get more men," he said.
Mohd Amir said the refurbishment of the remaining 131 district police offices would be done in stages and that 837 more stations in not so busy areas would be done later. He said with the new concept, the public can expect police stations to be more people friendly, which would further help the force to strive for greater excellence. "If it is a people friendly station, the public will be eager to come. It will be just like going to the bank for a business transaction," he said.
Mohd Amir also said that the PRS, a computerised reporting system wherea complainants can type their reports straight onto computers, had been a major success for the force. "Currently, police stations in the west coast of the peninsula have been equipped with the system. Now, we are implementing it in the east coast areas and later extend it to Sabah and Sarawak," he said.
The PRS system had proven to reduce reporting time, improve the documentation of crime index statistics and also help stations nationwide to exchange information on criminals in a fast and accurate manner, he said. "That is why we are focusing on IT (information technology) now. We want to be paperless one day, get rid of documentation which slow down our procedures. With one click you can get complete statistics of a specific crime nationwide," Mohd Amir added.
**** If it works and I'm sure it will if the staff do their job properly, police stations won't be for long the place of fear that many consider it as. However one must be cautious as time and again we've seen that despite the best of intentions old habits die hard and things slowly get back to the bad old ways. Hopefully this time around there will be unqualified success. All the best to the cops.
posted by The Malaysian. at 8/17/2006 08:10:00 PM
1 Comments:
Frankly the last time(2002) I went to make a police report at Sentul Police station after my daughter's handbag got picked, I was astounded with the people friendly environment and the people friendly staff(cute and polite young policewomen manning the counters and readily assisting the public who couldnt read or write).Like our politician always say "a paradigm shift".
But I had to make a report to apply for a new IC.I knew there would be no result at the end of the day. Anytime I or someone I know who got picked later, if not having lost important documents seldom bother to make a report.
Results matter and speedily. Hope with the new set-up, complainants wouldn't have to be kept waiting while the IO is out on the scene and you wait until the cows come home.
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