Insecurity: Senate wants Police Force decentralized

The Senate Ad-Hoc Committee on Security Challenges has called for the decentralization of the Nigeria Police Force (NPF) as a way of improving efficiency aimed at addressing the problem of insecurity bedeviling the country.

Consequently, the upper chamber recommended to the executive arm of government that the Police Command structure be decentralized with operational and budgetary powers vested in the zonal commands.

According to a press statement signed by Ezrel Tabiowo, Special Assistant (Press) to the Senate President, these formed part of recommendations contained in the report of the Senate Ad-Hoc Committee on Security Challenges.

The Chamber also recommended that all Joint operations should be carried out strictly in accordance with extant operational procedures provided in the Armed Forces Act.

It advised the federal government to make full payment of allowances to officers and men involved in operations; introduce effective insurance scheme, gratuity and pensions; as well as setup a National Defence Fund backed by legislation, into which all Nigerian adults and businesses should make contributions for revival and investment in the National Defence Industry.

Earlier, Chairman of the Ad-Hoc Committee, Yahaya Abdullahi (APC – Kebbi North), while reading from a 74 page report on the Urgent Need to Restructure, Review and Reorganize the Urgent Security Architecture in the country, disclosed that the panel during the course of engaging heads of security agencies and stakeholders, discovered that there are ill-defined operational boundaries and overlapping jurisdictions among security services.

According to him, “there is a lot of incoherence and inter-personnel conflict which have led to a lot of antagonism within the security organizations.”

The lawmaker blamed the high level of inefficiency among security agencies on lingering inter-personnel disputes.

“The absence or inadequacies of effective corrective mechanisms within those institutions allowed inter-personal disputes to fester thereby undermining the operational efficiency of the services.”

Abdullahi observed further that the alleged non-funding of the Office of the National Security Adviser since 2015 has undermined the effective performance of its coordinating function in the Security Architecture, and has led many agencies to question its authority and relevance in various fora, thereby adversely affecting inter-service cooperation and intelligence sharing.

He blamed failure to define functions and boundaries between intelligence agencies on defective laws governing the operation of the Department of State Services (DSS), National Intelligence Agency (NIA) and Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA).