The West African sub-region is bedeviled with security threats from terrorist organizations and jihadists travelling from north Africa. These incessant threats and actual attacks launched against many West African countries and particularly Ghana’s north and west bordered countries has heightened the fear and the possibility of terrorist organizations and jihadists infiltrating Ghana through her porous borders to launch similar attacks on the state. Also, the close proximity of some of the attacks launched on Burkina Faso and Ivory Coast to Ghana are manifestations of the possibility of similar attacks on the Ghanaian state.

The security agency legally mandated to control movement of people and goods across borders is the Ghana Immigration Service. However, the porousness of the borders among other challenges have resulted in the movement of people and goods into Ghana without any serious checks to sniff out illegal immigrants and goods. The fight against terrorism requires not just the expert effort of the security agencies but also, awareness creation among the citizenry.

It is on the back of this that CDD-Ghana is implementing e a 42-month project that will engage citizens in border communities for preventive measures against the surging threat of terrorist attacks and violent extremism.

The project is principled on inclusive governance and the maxim that security is a shared responsibility. The project will specifically:

1. To increase the level of security consciousness and awareness of citizens in border communities.

2. To improve citizens’ confidence and build trust between the citizens and security services,

3. To enhance citizen involvement in community policing, and build a culture of information sharing across the borders (among Ghanaian communities and their counterparts in neighboring countries.