All eyes on you: The prickly business of pricey barbed wire

With demand soaring in wake of the APS attack, supply of CCTV camera and other security equipment takes a hit.

PESHAWAR:

Sales of CCTV cameras, barbed wire and metal detectors have sky rocketed. Hence, they are no longer freely available in the market. What used to cost an average man about Rs1,300 for a CCTV camera or Rs800 for a metal detector now goes for more than Rs4,000.

Not in stock

Razor wire—wire lined with razors—is used as a protective measure outside offices and government institutions. It used to cost Rs2,000 per bundle and can cover up to 35 feet. Now, it costs Rs6,000 per bundle. It was earlier available at almost every stall in Reti Bazaar, but has been out of stock in the market since an announcement made by provincial information minister Mushtaq Ghani about the security measures that should be adopted by schools and other educational  institutes.



Last week, Ghani said it was imperative to follow a security plan. This plan includes installing CCTV cameras around buildings, barriers at the gate, deploying security guards at the front and back gates throughout the day, putting up walk-through gates, search lights, alarm systems and increasing the height of the boundary walls and then adding razor or barbed wire on top as an extra measure.

What’s happened so far

After this announcement, Ghani added any school which does not follow the security protocol will not receive an NOC and action will be taken against them. To show they meant business, Edwardes College was shut down on January 13 for two weeks for not adopting these policies.

Most schools are taking these security measures seriously and have decided not to reopen till they have everything in place.



On January 14, a few private school representatives protested against the security parameters defined by the government. They claimed smaller schools would not be able to afford these measures. “Schools that have been built on plots of 200 square yards don’t have the capacity to ensure that this (security measures) is followed to the T,” said Zafar Iqbal of the All Private Schools Association in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa, who led the protest. “The government is forcing schools to shut down by threatening them this way. Security is the responsibility of the government because we pay them taxes.” He added the government has failed in providing educational institutes with foolproof security.

Sniffing out trouble

Iqbal claimed that the government had also asked for sniffer dogs to be present outside school gates so children’s bags can be thoroughly checked. “Is the principal going to stand outside taming the dogs, or will he actually get to do some work?” he retorted.

Inspector gadget

Shopkeeper Fazal Naeem, who has been at the Gul Haji Plaza for years, said there was a time when in three months, he would only be able to sell one metal detector. Now, he claims, all of them have been sold as school authorities have been stocking up.

“First, it used to be banks or security companies who were interested in buying these detectors,” he said. “These days, it’s schools. Since it is mandatory for them, they have taken everything we had. We are not even getting more supply from Karachi or Lahore. People come and ask me if I have it, I have to turn them away.” He added metal detectors which used to cost Rs1,000 are now going for Rs4,000, if any shop still has stock.



Muhammad Sajjad, who runs a CCTV camera store, claimed his sales had gone up by 50%. “The price for everything—cameras, hard disks and digital video recorders—has gone up tenfold,” he said. “The total cost of getting all these items can go up to Rs30,000 for a small school, which requires around four CCTV cameras.”

A man sitting in Sajjad’s store, Fazal Hakeem, said he had come to make some purchases. Hakeem runs a school near Haji Camp and is trying to follow the government’s instructions. “We hire teachers within Rs10,000 but getting a security guard is costing us Rs5,000 extra,” he said. “One school needs at least three security guards—that is Rs45,000. It throws us off our budget.”

Published in The Express Tribune, January 19^th, 2015.