By Harry Awurumibe, Editor Abuja Bureau
Two months to the start of the TotalEnergies Africa Cup of Nations (AFCON) Cameroon 2021, the Confederation of Africa Football (CAF) Safety and Security Department has again at the weekend organised a Workshop for Hotels Safety and Security Coordinators selected for the competition.
This much was disclosed on Friday by Head of Safety and Security Department in CAF, Dr. Christian Emeruwa, disclosed that the workshop was another great opportunity to enlighten Hotels Safety and Security Coordinators on what will be expected of them when the AFCON kicks off in Cameroon next January.
According to him: “We are happy to have facilitated the organisation of the Hotels Safety and Security Coordinators Workshop.
These Safety and Security Coordinators of hotels are going to be responsible for the Security and Safety of all the (24) teams and all the officials that will be attending or participating in the AFCON in Cameroon.
Emeruwa also posited that: “we feel it is very important to have this session with all the Security Coordinators in the Official Hotels to let them understand their roles and their responsibilities and also the enormous work that they have to undertake in respect to ensuring that the established protocol that has been put in place by CAF Safety and Security for all the hotels are duly respected especially as it has to do with Access Control and Assets Protection.
Explaining further he said: “You will agree with me that accommodation is very important for the teams, the serenity that is required, the privacy that is required, all these have to be effectively managed by the Hotels Safety and Security Coordinators.
“So this was a very successful workshop as we had in attendance all the Safety and Security Coordinators from all the venues and the hotels and it is very good sign for us that we are gradually covering all the critical stakeholders that will be operational and that will be responsible in providing the Safety and Security Strategic Operational Commands during the course of the AFCON.
An elated Emeruwa also said: “we are happy that we are taking one step at a time to deliberate or interact with the critical stakeholders, as you may recall that we have had similar workshops for Team Security Officers, Team Security Liaison Officers, we had similar workshops for the Venues Operational Commanders and we had similar workshops for the Police Escorts Commanders”.
“Now we are having for the Hotels Safety and Security Team and the next workshop we hope to have very soon and we are planning to do this in Cameroon itself. It’s going to be for the Stadium Security Officers and the Training Site Security Officers. So these are the other groups we intend to have another comprehensive workshops with them before the end of this month”.