GEORGE TOWN: Penang police and the Malaysian Crime Prevention Foundation (MCPF) Penang branch are jointly working to make Penang safer than it is now.

For that purpose, both went on a study tour to the Indonesian National Police in Jakarta recently to learn how the country managed its major crime cases so that the same methods could be adopted here.

The four-day visit was led by Penang MCPF chairman Datuk Seri Syed Jaafar Syed Ali, who was accompanied by state police chief Datuk Seri A. Thaiveegan.

Thaiveegan said Jakarta was chosen as the venue for the study tour because of its similarities to Penang as a tourist destination.

“There were three main areas of discussion and sharing sessions between us and the Indonesian authority – counter terrorism, criminal investigation and drug investigation.

“It was a fruitful meeting. We definitely learned new things such as their ways of policing activities and approaches,” he told the NSTP.

Thaiveegan said the delegation was also taken to the Indonesian police training facilities at Sekolah Tinggi Ilmu Kepolisian, where they were exposed to the effective methods of organising short meetings with their personnel.

He said he was most impressed with the terrorism unit, where the Indonesian police had a special database on how to detect terrorists based on their behaviour.

“They have analysed and separated them under different types of terrorists, what was the cause and the kind of training given to them to counter such group.

“With more observation they can detect the terrorist. Their success so far in preventing terrorism speaks for itself,” he said.

Following the study tour, Thaiveegan planned for a police personnel exchange programme in order to further boost the rapport between the cops from both countries.

“But this depends on Bukit Aman, we will leave it to them,” he said.

He said that both MCPF and the police concluded that the cooperation with the members of the public was important to tackle crime.

Also present during the study tour was Universiti Sains Malaysia head of criminology and policing investigation Associate Professor Dr P. Sundramoorthy.

This first article first appeared on NST, reported by Mohamed Basyir. Image featured in this news article is from NST.