Mental Disorder And Society

(Tuesday, 10th November 2009 Issue)

The Police Crime Management Coordinator, Yankuba Sonko, speaking during a press briefing recently convened to shed more light on the Jambur killing, decried the rate at which abnormal people roam our streets.

This he noted is mainly due to the constraints affecting their works coupled with other unavoidable circumstances.

It is commonsense that the police cannot indefinitely keep or detain them at police stations.

CMC Sonko also raised concern that even whereas they are kept, some do escape, blaming it on communication lapses between the public and the police and also between the police and the medical services.

This suggests that there is a need for dialogue to find a lasting solution to this problem.

Hence, the police cannot be present in all places at the same time, there is a need to forge closer collaboration with all cadres of people to help redress this situation.

"The police cannot be aware of all these happenings," he explained, "and sometimes the public comes very late when something happens," the CMC was quoted as saying.

"Crime expands according to our willingness to put up with it."

George Farquhar