Nigeria Police Force: A virus that can’t be defeated until decentralised

BY AMOS AJIBOYE

Nigeria is running a presidential system of government, with a taste of a parliamentary system to cater for the interest of the political figures.

The Nigerian government has one of the most terrible constitutions in the world leaving political leaders untouchable and all-powerful, as such, making the people wallow at their draconian discharge.

The United States is one of the earliest countries to adopt a presidential system of government as seen in their constitution. The constitution made sure of reasonable and achievable checks and balances on all arms of government.

Nigeria has purportedly copied the same presidential system of government but omitting features that disinterests the authors/associates of the criminal documents titled the 1999 constitution.

Among the features of a presidential government is the allowance of the decentralisation of power to the states associated with it. Hence, making each state control their police and other agencies. In the case of Nigeria, such is prohibited, to ensure all powers are right in the hands of the president.

The police force is one of the most crucial units in each state as it’s expected to enforce laws and orders. In a state where police operate but are controlled externally, there might be a breach of interest.

This is synonymous with a case where a family hires a guard for security but the guard is controlled by an external individual. The guard would work to satisfy the controller and not the family. Hence, there’ll definitely be a breach of peace in that family.

The Nigerian Police is adequately funded to level all sorts of criminals in the states but the criminals can’t be levelled if they share backgrounds with the police boss. Hence, there can’t be peace in the state till the police is made liable to the state authority.

There are countless offences committed by the Nigeria police and almost none of them are punishable. An example is the case of the brutality at the #EndSars Memorial where an Uber driver was brutalized amongst others. The police officer in question wasn’t punished till date because the people and state have no power to punish.

The police force is often used to commit crimes by political leaders to secure their interests. Another case is the invasion of the residence of s supreme court justice by policemen. Till date, none of them have been brought to book.

There’s no checkpoint where police officers do not take bribes and kickbacks thereby extorting the citizens. To date, none of them have been stopped.

Just to add, in a political space where multi party system is in operation, a particular political leader should not be in possession of the balls of his counterparts. That is, an APC leader should not directly or indirectly be controlling an AAC-led state. Because, in a case of rift and disagreement, powers would definitely be abused.

Part of the crises faced in Nigeria is caused by the centralisation of the country. No state is buoyant of itself until intervention from the federal. Hence, It weakens and renders each state toothless.

Part of the crimes the police force is used for are; rigging, intimidation, oppression and many others. The moment the police is decentralised, there would be a reduction in rigging, intimidation and oppression in states.

Unfortunately, those are the fears of the federal government and can’t afford to let go of such evil. The governor of Ondo once lamented that the police in his states refused to arrest herdsmen as they’ve been ordered from above not to do so.

The number 1 hope of the citizens should be the police force but many Nigerians would choose bandits and kidnappers over the dreadful, compromised and manipulated Nigerian police.

I’ll end this note by opposing the blunders usually written in police stations that; ‘Police is your friend’. A stranger can’t be a friend?