Bahrain government plans to install surveillance cameras in public places across the Southern Governorate in a bid to put an end to growing acts of vandalism, said a report.

Under the plans, which have been presented to officials at the Works, Municipalities and Urban Planning Affairs Ministry by the Southern Municipal Council, security will also be stepped up in parks and traditional suqs.

Councillor Abdullatif Mohammed said the proposal should urgently be approved by authorities because public parks were being destroyed every day.

'We want to set up cameras in parks and suqs across the governorate to ensure no one is misusing parks and public places,' he said during the council's weekly session.

"Parks, including the new ones, are destroyed every day by vandals who escape unpunished. This proposal aims to maintain the cleanliness of the parks to ensure a clean undamaged place for people," he noted.

Southern Municipality director-general Asem Abdullatif suggested forming a committee within the council to follow up with the proposed plan.

"I suggest creating a committee to follow up with this kind of proposals because this can help us complete it quickly," he told the councillors.

'We have already discussed the financial costs for setting up cameras in public places but we want a list of all the places that we can start with.

'We should also keep in mind that big places will cost us much more than the small ones because they need more cameras.'

The GDN earlier reported on a similar anti-vandalism drive spearheaded by the Northern Municipality, which will install surveillance cameras at 15 locations on a trial basis.

It also proposed introducing hourly fingerprint 'checkpoint' scans in parks across the Northern Governorate, in a bid to put an end to lazy security guards shirking their responsibilities.

Meanwhile, Southern councillors, during their weekly session, also discussed the importance of introducing women-only days in Khalifa Grand Park in Riffa.

It was first proposed in March to encourage more women to visit the park, but the Southern Municipality has still not approved it.

'We have submitted our proposal last month and we hope that the municipality won't delay it as we want our sisters to feel comfortable when they are at the park,' said area councillor Yousif Al Sabbagh.-TradeArabia News Service