Some 191 military personnel graduated recently after successful completing various professional training courses of between 2 to 3 months, conducted at the Fajara training school.
The graduation took the form of military parades at the Fajara barracks witnessed by senior security officers.
Colonel Sambou Barrow representing the chief of defense staff, said continued capacity building training for GAF helps broaden the knowledge base of officers, non-commissioned officers and soldiers in a bid to enhance their professional skills needed to execute assigned duties and responsibilities.
According to him, the senior non-commissioned cadre, junior non-commissioned cadre, military police intelligence, clerical and signal cadres are all designed to improve the structural and operational capacities of GAF to enhance greater institutional competence and convenience.
“Your role in the military is critical, because you are referred to as the backbone of any military establishment; in other words, you are the link between the command and the soldiers,” he emphasized.
According to the deputy military spokesperson 2nd Lt. Kemo Kanuteh, the graduation ceremony marked the successful completion of a month-long intensive training session of the J/SNCO Tactical Cadre, the Military Police Cadre and the Signals, three of which are professionally conducted simultaneously by the Commandant and Instructors of GAFTS, the birthplace of every soldier.
The trainees were taught lessons in tactics, field craft, map reading, estimates and orders process, physical training, among others.
Topics such as investigation and interrogation, drugs and narcotics handling, civil-military relationship, civil and criminal offences, marriage investigation, just to name a few, where all covered.
He said: “The signals on the other hand took lessons on the roles and duties of a signaler, voice conversation, antenna propagation, frequency management, information assurance, Microsoft applications, basic networking, spectrum management, radio discipline etc.”
Army chiefs at the event believe that training in the military is an ongoing process through which the learning of new techniques and tactics are done.
Endowed with six common senses to which some people may raise eyebrows, the soldiers of the GAF are always put through capacity building in order to keep them at par with new trends in the art of modern day computer age.
The commandant of the Gambia Armed Forces Training School, Captain Abdoulie Jobe, said the MPs and signalers have been trained in their various professional fields to enhance their professional output.
“Their roles and responsibilities cannot be overemphasized, since the armed force is like a tree with support services serving as its roots. The graduating students of signals cadre will not only graduate as well-trained signalers, but also as signals cadre with an added expertise on modern computer software applications.”
