G4S Kenya’s Secure Solutions division recently provided its dedicated Mobile Command Centre to the Billie Jean King Cup (BJKC) tournament and security services to protect athletes and spectators at the event. The BJKC tournament – which took place last month – is the world’s largest annual women’s international team sports competition in terms of the number of nations that compete and is considered the premier international women’s tennis team competition.
G4S worked with government agencies including the Ministry of Sport, the Diplomatic Police and the Tourist Protection Police to plan the logistics of a comprehensive security operation.
The G4S team deployed a specialist mobile command vehicle to coordinate the plans for all the security agencies and stakeholders. The vehicle is used at high-visibility and high footfall functions such as music concerts, sports meetings and to secure events where large gatherings are expected.
G4S Kenya repurposed the vehicle in 2019 to include communication and surveillance systems. It features a number of both static and movable surveillance cameras and the footage is fed into the mobile command centre, where a dedicated security controller monitors it, making it an effective transportable control room.
The BJKC – formerly the Federation Cup – was launched in 1963 to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the International Tennis Federation.
Kenya was selected to host Africa’s top tier of the competition, Group III, with the winners (South Africa this year) being promoted to the Group II event in Europe. The tournament featured 12 countries, including top seed South Africa, hosts Kenya, as well as Mauritius, Uganda, Madagascar, Tunisia, Burundi, Nigeria, Zimbabwe, Ghana, Namibia and Botswana.
The various security agencies deployed to the event were grateful to G4S for providing this vehicle, and for the operations support that it provided for the event.
The secretary general of the Tennis Federation was especially grateful for the support from G4S. Ms. Wanjii Mbugua, Secretary General of the Tennis Kenya Federation and Vice President of the Confederation of African Tennis, said: “An event of this size has so many moving parts that it is impossible to plan completely for every aspect. Without adequate security for the players, officials and fans, this would not have been a successful tournament. We are grateful to G4S for being here before the event to assist in planning, and during the event to help in securing this tournament. On behalf of the entire planning committee, we would like to express our deep gratitude as a federation and as a country to the dedicated support from G4S Kenya.”
