Mental assessment of traffic police officers starts
Kampala, Uganda | THE INDEPENDENT | Uganda Police Force- UPF in partnership with Makerere University has started a mental assessment exercise for traffic police officers.
The assessment started on Thursday with officers answering written and verbal questions that will be a basis of determining the magnitude of mental related concerns.
Acting Commissioner for Police Force Wealth, Christine Olyel Olanya, said the assessment was approved by Policy Advisory Committee –PAC, chaired by Inspector General of Police, John Martins Okoth Ochola.
Olanya said the assessment seeks to understand what drives actions of some police officers while on duty or barracks. She said some officers develop mental problems just because of transfers that make them abandon their families.
In 2018, police officers were forcefully evicted from Naguru and Nsambya barracks after they had declined transfers to other places. Police officers who spoke to journalists said police had not provided for them accommodation that was sufficient to go with their families to their news workstations.
Makerere University Psychologist, Prof Edward Bantu, also Vice President for World Council for Psychotherapy, said several factors escalate police officers’ mental health. These factors, according to Prof Bantu, include traffic, political or crime incidents they deal with on a daily basis.
In the last three weeks, two police officers have committed suicide using their own guns. Police Constables, Bernard Wakuma and Ben Langoya, terminated their lives at their respective workstation in Kampala and Ntungamo.
Wakuma was attached to Very Important Person’s Protection Unit –VIPPU allegedly ended his life using his own gun. Wakuma ended his life from Pastor Robert Kayanja’s home in Ggaba, Makindye Division, in Kampala.
Earlier on, Langoya, attached to Ntungamo Police Station was found in a sitting position in a pool of blood with a big wound on the head. Langoya’s suicide came three months after Constables Ernest Kasadha, attached to Buwuni Police Post in Bulesa sub-county in Bugiri district and Wilson Kalungi attached to Filed Force Unit –FFU in Lwengo District committed suicide.
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