By GINNAH MINI
THE Royal Papua New Guinea Constabulary (RPNGC) has officially launched the National Call Centre (NCC) on Friday 13th March, marking a milestone in the continued modernization and strengthening of policing in Papua New Guinea (PNG).
NCC is a one call away system that is designed to ensure quick, effective and reliable assistance from Police and Emergency responders when citizens are in need.
Police Commissioner David Manning, while officiating the launching reiterated that the RPNGC’s NCC is a centralized communication and coordination facility established to receive, assess and coordinate responses to emergency and security related information from the public.
“A national rollout has commenced, which will see all 112(Toll free) calls for police assistance are received and charged by a dedicated specialist team at the RPNGC NCC,” said Manning.
“Calls received at the NCC are handled by trained operators to assess reported incidents prior to calls in accordance with strict parameters, record the incident at the Electronic Occurrence Book (EOB) system and verify the information before it is referred to operational response.”
This initiative is a collaboration from Paragon Systems Limited’s technical support and management, together with NICTA and Department of ICT for enabling the telecommunication framework that allows the 112-emergency service to operate nationally.
Manning said that verified incidents will be referred to the appropriate divisional police operation centers and provincial police operation centers which are responsible for coordinating the deployment of police patrols and operational units on the ground.
He added that the RPNGC NCC integrates several important operational systems that strengthen situational awareness and operational coordination which include the 112 emergency telecommunications platforms, EOB, and police radio communications.
“This is the start of a multi-faceted approach to ensuring that technology assists police in effective police service delivery,” said Manning.
The establishment of the RPNGC NCC forms part of the ICT rehabilitation project through the Special Police Assistance Program (SPAP) under Marape-Rosso Government.
It was concluded that National Call Centre is an initiative that represents a major step forward in improving how the RPNGC receives information from the public and coordinates emergencies responses across the country.