The Public Agenda newspaper says its undercover investigations at the Italian Embassy have revealed that some personnel of the Ghana Police Service and the Armed Forces are robbing shoulders with visa contractors in the lucrative visa application delivery business. The visa application delivery business is a protocol service provided by both uniformed and non-uniformed police and military personnel which is practiced at all the embassies. But the paper says lately, the Italian Embassy has become a gold mine. In a report carried in its Friday edition, Agenda said earlier in the week, two visits by its reporters confirmed the brisk business. Some aggrieved visa applicants told Public Agenda that the police and military are allowed to break all the rules regarding the submission of visa applications. With that VIP treatment, they collect scores of visa applications a day for delivery at a fee of between 50 to 100 euros. On a good day one police or military officer is able to submit seven applications, earning a cool 700 euros or more depending on the agreed fee. A lady who only identified herself as Priscilla said the police and military usually submit the application forms of people who wish to take a permit visa and are sure they would be given the visa. The Italian Embassy which until recently was not really patronized by Ghanaians wishing to travel to Europe has received major public patronage because of the flexible visa acquisition process. As a result, a noticeable sight of personnel of the Ghana Police Service and the Armed Forces whether in uniform or not has become the norm at the embassy. One visa applicant who made a desperate call to the newspaper to investigate the involvement of security personnel in visa deals said many of them usually take excuse duties from the office to carry out their activities at the embassy. “Our investigations revealed that the embassy currently receives over a thousand applicants a day with some of the applicants who come from all parts of the country compelled to sleep in the open due to their inability to submit their applications.” The paper said its reporter who also posed as an applicant after spending more than an hour in a queue was approached by a 'Good Samaritan' who suggested that if he wanted to fast track his application he should get the services of the police and military-men. True to his word, when the reporter approached someone identified as a police officer, he agreed to help at a fee of 70 euros. According to the police officer he had come to submit the forms of six people, so it was going to be quite difficult submitting a seventh one, and agreed to pass it on to a colleague for submission. As if on cue, on Wednesday, the Ghana Armed Forces issued a strong statement regretting the increasing rate at which some military personnel are enticed to offer their services to private individuals, friends, relatives and sometimes agencies for a fee. The statement signed by the Director of Public Relations, Colonel E.W.K. Nibo alerted the public that some members of the military were being hired for some services by members of the public. The statement said the authorities had further observed that any time the military personnel got involved in such issues, civilian accomplices mostly craftily push the culpability to the soldiers. The Director of Public Relations said the soldiers who had to face the appropriate disciplinary action turned to jeopardize their careers as well as casting a slur on the image of the Ghana Armed forces. Colonel Nibo further indicated that the authorities have already warned personnel of the military to desist from such practices and that any member of the military who indulged in any unofficial and unauthorized assistance to any private individual, agency, company or organization that would tarnish the reputation of the Armed Forces would be severely dealt with. The statement also advised the public to stop engaging the services of military personnel for unauthorized operations because the practice was illegal. Source: Public Agenda