The chief executive officer and general manager of the Security Expert Guard Agency of Liberia (SEGAL), Mr. Momo Cyrus, has officially turned over a fully installed assortment of vital security equipment to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Bureau of Passport and Visas. The assorted equipment is worth US$16,000.

Few months ago, Mr. Cyrus and his technical partner, Mr. Lionel Keller, II, donated the surveillance equipment to the Ministry and offered to install them. The items included 16 Samsung CCTV cameras, one recorder for the cameras, 16 rolls of cable for the inter-connection of the cameras, four (4) electronic locks for biometric fingerprint access control, four (4) magnetic locks and four (4) pieces of power supply control.  Also included is a one-terabyte hard drive for storing the pieces of information that would be gathered by the cameras.

A Foreign Ministry release states that before handing the equipment over to the Ministry, through the Director of Passports and Visas, Ms. Marian F. Sandi, SEGAL’s technical partner, Mr. Keller, II, disclosed that the two 16-channeled televisions have the capacity to record all or most of the day-to-day happenings within the Bureau.

“The hard-drive is one terabyte and can go for at least 30 to 60 days before it is full, depending on the amount of information it has gathered,” he stated. He warned that the drive begins to erase itself when it is full to give way for more space.

He noted that the CCTVs record based on movement and that when there are no movements, it stops recording most especially at night. Keller stated that in case of power outage, the biometric locks automatically open so that no one gets trapped until the electricity is restored and it begins to function again.

Before handing over the surveillance equipment to Ms. Sandi, SEGAL’s chief executive officer and general manager, Mr. Cyrus, told her that whenever there is an investigation or a problem, the Ministry’s Information Technology (IT) personnel shouldn't touch the equipment in the absence of SEGAL’s maintenance team, which will manage and maintain the system for one year before the Ministry takes over its maintenance.

“This is a complete Class ‘A’ Security System that you have here now. This system may go for at least five years if maintained properly,” he disclosed.

Formally receiving the equipment, Ms. Sandi, in very brief remarks, thanked SEGAL for the system, which she described as being very helpful. “Since the installation of this system, our work has been made a lot easier. We see what’s happening in all parts of the Bureau where the cameras are installed,” she said.

A closed-circuit television is a TV system in which signals are not publicly distributed but are monitored and recorded primarily for surveillance and security purposes.