Ghana’s waters a haven for transit vessels – Navy

“Ghana’s waters have become a safe waiting area for ships calling in ports in neighbouring countries,” Rear Admiral Moses Kwadwo Beick-Baffour, the Chief of staff at the General Headquarters of the Ghana Armed Forces, has said. 

 He said the Ghana Navy now had a crop of special force operatives who could handle asymmetric threats such as hostage rescue onboard ships and maritime interdiction operations.

Real Admiral Beick-Baffour was addressing officers and men at the Ghana Navy’s West Africa Security Services Association (WASSA) get together, which also took account of their achievements for 2017.

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He said everything that the Service had achieved was a collective effort of the High Command, Officers, Ratings, Civilian Employees and stakeholders within and outside, adding, “0ur teamwork has held the anchor firm during the stormy times in 2017”.

Real Admiral Beick-Baffour said the Ghana Navy had experienced a very successful year looking back to many achievements worth celebrating, explaining, “We have had our challenges but we choose to celebrate the success as we learn from the shortfalls”.

He said the Navy continued to improve its maritime domain awareness capabilities with the installations of new surveillance equipment in all maritime operations centres at the Naval Headquarters.

Two new State of the Art surveillance equipment, he said, were also mounted at the Western and Eastern borders at Newtown and Aflao.

Rear Admiral Beick-Baffour said the Navy was able to for the first time in many years, put an unprecedented number of ships to sea with the aim of assessing their performances, which were found to be outstanding.

He said: “The Navy was, therefore, ready when called upon to protect the nation’s assets at sea and ensure the integrity of our exclusive economic zone following the ruling of the International Tribunal of the Law of the Sea.”

Its goal of improving its presence at sea was overwhelmingly achieved resulting in no recorded piracy incident in the waters of Ghana, he said.

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Deserving Officers and civilian employees at the Naval Headquarters were awarded for exceptional delivery of their duties at the event, which was interspersed with music and dance.

Admiral Arthur Sampah Randy Nuno, a former Chief of Naval Staff commended the Ghana Navy for the success chalked during the year.

He urged them not to drift away from the rules of the Service and advised the awarded Officers to do more because the award placed on them, a higher responsibility.

He told the Officers to take extra care of themselves in the festive season and be generous.