‘We’re the best in Africa’ – police reject ‘unfavourable’ report

The Nigeria police force has described as false and mischievous, the 2016 World Internal Security and Police Index (WISPI) that ranked it as the worst in the world.

WISPI, released by two bodies – the International Police Science Association and the Institute for Economics and Peace, had assessed the police in 127 countries in areas of capacity, process, legitimacy and outcomes.

The report said Nigeria underperformed on all four areas, with a score of 0.255.

Reacting, Jimoh Moshood, police spokesman, described the research as baseless , saying it is an attempt to “cast aspersions on the achievement of the police”.

Moshood said Nigeria police force is currently the best in Africa, judging by its performance.

“The report is not correct, the Nigeria police force rejects it in its entirety because it is complete falsehood,” he told TheCable.

“For the avoidance of doubt, the performance of the Nigeria police force at this critical time is at the highest because if you go to various missions across the world, our personnel are there doing the country proud.

“And even when you look at our performance in terms of internal security, cases of kidnapping and armed robbery have drastically reduced to the barest minimum. The security situation in the country now is such that people can go about their duties without any fear.

“So it is wrong for an unknown organisation to come up with such report. We do not know the yardstick they used and definitely, it is not empirical. Who did they talk to? Such an organisation should know there are equally legal implications against falsehood.”

He said as evidence that the force is the best in Africa, Nigeria is currently the leader of INTERPOL in Africa, adding: “If we are the worst, we will not be elected as the leader of INTERPOL on the continent”

Moshood added: “As we speak, the Somalia police hierarchy is in Nigeria to understudy what we are doing at home here; to copy from us. So if they are here, that shows you we have achieved a lot.

“Even for elections security in Nigeria, we have done the best in ensuring peaceful election in various parts of the country and we will continue to do our best to ensure that elections are peaceful.

“And in checking excesses within the force, a lot has been done in that regard.

“So we want Nigerians to disregard the report in its entirety because it doesn’t reflect the achievements of the force.”