The Uganda Police Force (UPF) has pipped its newly promoted gazetted officers at the rank of Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) to Senior Commissioner of Police (SCP) in the event held at Nagulu Police Headquarters.
Presiding over the event, Martin Okoth Ochola, the Inspector General of Police congratulated the officers, the families and friends of the promoted officers for responding to the invitation and the support rendered in the course of their employment.
Martin Okoth Ochola said that in the past two years, the UPF Management has promoted over 15,000 personnel to various ranks. The frequency of promotions and numbers of promoted officers would have been more, but there was a backlog created as a result of investigations initiated by the Inspectorate of Government on the previous promotions of 2016.
The investigations by the office of the Inspectorate of Government created a big backlog with dire consequences to our human resource administration and development. For example, currently, this phase has the highest number of promoted officers in the history of the Uganda Police Force, but still, there are many other deserving officers pending.
Martin Okoth Ochola thanked the Appointments/ Promotions Committees and all the relevant stakeholders for the work so far done and urged the officers to address the continued occurrence of the few irregularities, although minor, in the promotion process that continues to dent or threaten the promotion system that we are building.
“To have a robust system, demands constant work to improve our Force’s Human Resource management, including Information Technology through building and maintaining a clean data base for our Human Resource. Therefore, I want to emphasize that our immediate goal and task at hand is to integrate technology in our human resource management, above all, to address the few loopholes in the recruitment, deployment, promotion and retirement of our officers,” Ochola said.
Ochola added that equipping these newly promoted officers with the relevant policing knowledge and skills is the Police’s other priority. The Force will continue to conduct several management and career courses.
“Police Management will be paying particular attention to training. Large-scale training on integrity, ideological orientation, human rights, customer care and general professional conduct should become a regular part of our Forces’ life,” he noted.
He further revealed that the other most urgent priority is to address the challenge of welfare. As over recent years, Police will continue to improve the welfare of the officers and will also fully resolve the issue of providing decent housing soon.
A task of particular importance for the UPF Management immediately after this function will be ensuring that all officers that merit, but were not promoted, are identified and set for promotion in the next phase. It is important to make sure that the promotion process remains transparent and free from manipulation.
Ochola thanked His Excellency the President of the Republic of Uganda for promoting these officers to their various ranks and measuring up to the confidence placed in the officers to achieve even greater success in your service for the good of our people and country at large.
