British government through its London Police is to overhaul the ailing Nigeria police for effectiveness and efficiency.
The re-organisation of Nigeria police was the outcome of talks between President Umaru Yar’Adua and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown at the commonwealth Heads of State Summit held in Kampala, Uganda last week.
Minister of Interior, Major-General Godwin Abbe (retired) who led top functionaries of the country’s Para-military agencies to a meeting with President Umaru Yar’Adua yesterday at the Presidential Villa Abuja confirmed this to State House Correspondents.
To this end, a presidential committee that would comprise both retired and serving prominent Nigerians is being packaged to work out detail areas of possible intervention in the country’ s ailing police by the British Government.
"The extent of involvement will be determined by the committee that will be set up. Be that as it may you know the business of security is a continuous one, it is never ending, human beings exist and they are forever interacting and every new day brings about a new dimension of crime and so whatever assistance is necessary again once the committee deems it fit we will get. But I believe the British government has done well in the past and the Nigerian government appreciates that and that is the essence of the cordial relationship that has been between the government of Nigeria and the government of Britain", Abbe noted. He further said that the issue of the reorganization of the police force and the British involvement came up when Mr. President had a discussion with the British Prime Minister during his last Visit to the Common Wealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM), in Uganda . In the course of their discussion the British Prime Minister kindly requested Mr. President for what assistance Nigerian Government will like the British Government to assist and in the course of that discussion Mr. President told him that he would appreciate any support the British Government can give us in the matter of improving the security services of this country.
So against that background Mr. President is looking at the police force as the point element in the security services and that of course is giving room to this committee that is being set up to look at areas where we seriously need external help and also look at areas where we are capable of handling our problems ourselves before advising Mr. President and then he too and also advise the British Prime Minister on what area of assistance we may now ask for."
Abbe, however explained that the reorganisation would not necessarily provide a new leadership for the police as the new Inspector-General remains the head of the police throughout the period of the exercise; stressing that "it is not going to be sole administrator as it were. The IG is the most senior commander and the boss of the police force and there will be no change as far as that is concerned".
The meeting which lasted about an hour also approved that henceforth anybody of questionable character would not be allowed to be escorted by armed policemen as government can no longer tolerate the present practice of police providing safe landing to people of criminal behaviours by way of escorting them even to commit crimes.
Those at the meeting included the minister of state for Interior, Alhaji Hassan Haruna, newly confirmed Inspector-General of Police (IG), Mr Mike Okiro, Comptroller-General of the Nigerian Immigration Service, Mr Chukwura Ude, Deputy Comptroller-General of the Nigerian Prisons Service, Mr Ishaya Jagafa; Commander-General of the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence Corps, Dr Ade Agbolurin; and the Comptroller-General of Fire Service.
"We were privilege to secure this period to join Mr. President to have an overview of the general security situation in our country; and every aspect possible as far as internal security is concern was looked at and at the end of the day we had a very useful meeting with Mr. President".
"We have on authority that the British Government is ready to support us in reorganizing the Nigerian Police Force and empowering it to be able to carry out its assigned role of ensuring law and order. We also have instructions to put together a high-powered a committee comprising a experienced senior Nigerians who have distinguish themselves in service of this country in the police force to come together to look at the past and join us to looking at the future. And this committee is also going to look at the white paper, which was approved by government and assist in the implementation of the content as quickly as possible," the retired general said.
According to him, "other far reaching decisions included the issue of the misuse and abuse of the police elements, where you have a number of people not qualified to have armed security, they have guards, they have mobile policemen following them and some of them are known criminals in the society. Again, we believe that we are going to emphasis on training massively of all the security services from next year, we are going to instill discipline and ensure that any element who falls below expectation is ruthlessly dealt with and shown the way out because we must evolve a new and better police force," Abebe said continuing "as for the immigration, e-passport effort that government is putting in place is been well mapped out and areas where people are resisting change will be checked and the new system will be put in place properly to be able to ensure that the identify of our country is not in doubt.
"As far as the National Security and Civil Defence Crop is concern, we believe that their activities are commendable and must be strengthened to continue and must be ready to combat vandals to a stand still and ensure that our national economy is duly protected.
As for the Prisons, the issue of neglect and long-term abandonment was also identified and Mr. President has graciously accepted that from the new-year we are going to look problems of the Prisons holistically and start by addressing the worst case scenario and ensuring that prisons is properly administered. And we are going to examine the possibility of getting the states involved in the management of prison service so as to reduce burden on the problems of the FG by way of prisons administration."
By DANIEL IDONOR, Abuja
Daily Champion
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
