A two-week training programme for 550 personnel of the Police Rapid Deployment Force (RDF) from the Western and Central regions opened at Essipong near Sekondi on Monday. Some 350 of the personnel are drawn from the Western Region and the training is the fourth and the last in the series in preparation for the Ghana 2008 football tournament. Opening the programme Mr Kwesi Blay, Deputy Western Regional Minister, said the training was a prelude to the establishment of a Regional Police School at Sekondi. He said the training was to equip the personnel of the RDF with special skills to handle security concerns at the tournament and in the region, especially in Sekondi-Takoradi. Mr Blay said the government fully supported the training programme and would provide logistics and technical support. Mr Robert Mark Azu, Acting Regional Police Commander, said the name of the former Mobile Force unit has been changed to RDF to reflect the contemporary operational conduct of the Ghana Police Service. He assured the public that the police and the other security agencies had braced themselves for the task ahead to ensure trouble-free tournament in the region. Mr Azu said the security threats envisaged during the tournament in the region included human trafficking, black marketing, fake currency trafficking, attacks on supporters of opposing teams, terrorists acts, arson, prostitution and armed robbery. Source: GNA