Visit to Police Training Centre

THE Police Training Centre (PTC) at Gadong Police Headquarters hosted a visit by a group of 25 newly recruited prison wardens and cadet officers from the Prisons Department.

The visit led by the department's senior officers, provided the group comprised both male and female recruits, the opportunity to learn about the Royal Brunei Police Force's RBPF training programme for their recruits and observe them personally on how they were conducted.

A briefing on the training centre's history, mission, vision and core business as well as the various training programmes for officers and new police recruits was presented by Inspector Zainal Hj Ibrahim, acting commandant for the PTC. The briefing touched on the centre's role and responsibility within the force, its organisational structure, recruitment scheme and training programmes, among others.

The centre's core business is to educate recruits with knowledge of policing based on the foundations and direction of the force as well as to transform civilians into disciplined members of the force.

Inspector Zainal said that both the RBPF and Prisons Department are closely related in terms of training, organisation and scope of responsibilities particularly that of dealing with inmates.

He pointed out that the police are only responsible for detaining suspects to allow further investigations and/or to obtain enough evidence to convict the suspects in a court of law. When suspects were found guilty of the charges and given sentences, they would become the responsibility of the Prisons Department.

This is where the similarities can be found among the two agencies, he said, with the only difference being the period of imprisonment and the procedures for handling inmates.

Visitors were also informed on the various training programmes that are provided at the centre as well as the training categories that range from Additional Police Officer training (APO), Police Constable training (PC) and Recruit Cadet Officer training.

Shortly after the briefing, the visitors were then taken to the RBPF Museum Gallery where a range of archived criminal activities and various police duties and responsibilities were on display followed by a tour of the training facilities such as the marching field and living quarters.

The visitors also had a chance to observe one of the recruit training activities which was currently taking place at the time.