Millions of Nigerians shut out of police crime-reporting app

You have a crime to report? The Nigeria police force has launched a mobile application to enable you to do so.

There is a caveat though: You must be connected to the internet and must have a registered email address.

The ‘NPF Rescue Me!’ application was launched amid the growing security challenges across the country.

It also enables users to report an erring police officer and request an ambulance in addition to its navigation feature.

However, the application cannot open, much less operate without an active internet, meaning that it is not accessible to the millions of Nigerians who are not subscribed to the internet.

The majority of these individuals are in the rural areas, including in various communities across the north where bandits launch incessant attacks.

For one to register on the application, you must also input key details such as email address via which a one-time password will be sent to complete the registration.

The implication of this is that Nigerians who do not have an active email account cannot register on the application developed by Gulf Technologies Network.

The initiative comes about a year after Nigeria launched the emergency toll-free number which has not been effective amid complaints of it not usually being reachable.

On Tuesday, when TheCable reporter dialled the number multiple times, it failed to connect after the operator said the call “cannot be completed at the moment”.