13th May, 2015
With the Police Council finally confirming Mr. Solomon Arase as the substantive Inspector General of Police of Nigeria, we want to believe it is now time for him to begin to sanitise the force. Arase, who first replaced Suleiman Abba in acting capacity in April this year, must be ready to make a difference as helmsman of the force. It shouldn’t be business as usual. All Arase needed was the greater authority to begin to put in place effective policies to meet the yearning of Nigerians. With his confirmation, he now has the powers to go the whole hog.
The Nigeria Police Force, as it is currently constituted, seriously needs a surgical operation. It is an understatement to say that the force has lost its steam and is now seen as public enemy. It does not enjoy the confidence of the public because of the unprofessional and unethical conduct of some of the officers and men.
Apart from extremely poor human rights records, the police force is known to be one of the worst security agencies in the country, going by various surveys and opinions of civil and human rights organisations. Each day, there are tales by Nigerians of police brutality, impunity, harassment and extra judicial killings.
With a seeming lack of sanction or punishment for wrong doings, there is total break down of discipline within the force to the extent that men of the force no longer respect constituted authorities. On several occasions, there have been reports of junior police officers killing their senior counterparts. There have also been cases of police officers maltreating and even killing their wives and sometimes children in mad rage.
Nigerians also have sordid experiences after their encounters with the police. There have been cases of indiscriminate arrests of individuals. Many innocent people end up in court for phantom cases. Many are jailed for what they knew nothing about, that is if they are lucky not to be sentenced to death on trumped up charges by the police.
Questions have been raised about illegal detention and the crude methods of police investigations. Many Nigerians are no longer willing to help fellow citizens because cases of the complainant becoming the accused are rampant at police stations. Arase should address all these negative tendencies and also beam his searchlight on the Force CIDs and the Special Anti-Robbery Squad units where suspects allegedly ‘disappear’ through extra-judicial killings.
President Goodluck Jonathan, in confirming Arase on Tuesday, said Suleiman Abba was sacked because there was a lot of indiscipline in the force while he was in the saddle as IGP. This indiscipline cuts across the rank and file of the force and should be addressed. We expect Arase to learn from the fall of his predecessor and carve his name in gold. He should understand how the police got to this sorry state and clean the augean stable completely. We need an agency that would be the envy of policing in Africa.