Yemisi Izuora
The Network on Police Reform in Nigeria, NOPRIN, has raised constitutional concerns over the delay by president Muhammadu Buhari in appointing a new Inspector General of Police for the country.
NOPRIN said all actions being taking by the IGP, Ibrahim Idris presently is illegal as he has seized to be a police officer after his tenure expired.
Comrade Okey Nwanguma, national coordinator of NOPRIN, during his review of 2018 Police and Policing in Nigeria, in Lagos on Monday, argued the IGP has served out the mandatory 35 years of service, and has also attained the age of 60 years, and that any of the two qualifies a public servant for retirement.
He said that as far as the Network is concerned, any action taken by the IGP is null and void, and threatened to challenge the redeployment of the Commissioner of Police in Lagos state, Imohinmi Edgal in court as the IGP has already ceased to be a police officer on the date he attained 35 years in service.
Nwanguma said NOPRIN has embarked on sensitization campaign for overall reform of the country’s police force, as he observed that the year 2018 was not so much unlike any other year since Nigeria’s return to democratic processes in 1999 with regards to police and policing in Nigeria.
He said the one significant development that made the difference is the progress that has been made with the effort to review the colonial Police Act which still regulates the NPF 75 years after it was promulgated in 1943 by British colonial authorities.
Nwanguma, regretted that 59 years after independence, Nigeria Police Force is still being governed by a colonial law, not fit for purpose and which has seen no comprehensive review since its initial promulgation.
While commending Senator Bala Ibn Na’Allah, the sponsor of the Bill, the Senate Committee pushing the Bill, the Senate leadership for the enthusiastic support for the Bill and Policy and Legal Advocacy Centre (PLAC) for leading the renewed albeit long-standing Civil Society effort in the push for the Passage of the Bill, Nwanguma vowed to exert pressure for the Bill to be passed and forwarded to the president for assent.
He, recalled that the effort to review the Police Act has been long-drawn, starting from 2004 with slow progress being made over the years. “The current initiative culminated in the Senate public hearing on December 5, 2018, the closest we’ve ever come to having the colonial law reviewed.
Getting the Bill passed and assented to before the end of tenure of the current government will therefore, be for us, a momentous and significant milestone in the on-going effort to reform the Nigeria Police and deepen our faltering democracy” he said.
He insisted that Police reform is key to effective, transparent, responsive and accountable policing, which will in turn promote professionalism, respect for human rights and rule of law which are the hallmark of democracy.
Regrettably, the absence of a modern legal framework to drive police reform accounts essentially for the seeming lack of sustainable progress or the achievement of far reaching impact despite enormous investments and efforts at police reform since 1999, Nwanguma observed.
The bill to repeal and re-enact the Police Act, he said has gone through several stages of public consultation and a legal audit of all the laws engaging the police and other stakeholders from 1999 till date.
Offering further insight, he explained that the Bill seeks to bring the police up to date- to conform to modern democratic policing and also seeks to change the colonial orientation and philosophy of policing which focuses on regime protection and control of populations to democratic policing which focuses on service and protection of the people.
“The police should be accountable to multiple constituencies including the people through elected representatives, not just the executive arm of government. The police should be accountable to the law and not a law unto itself. The police should serve the interest of the larger population not the ruling party or government, he stated.
Under the period under review, Nwanguma said as in previous years, police abuse persisted in 2018 partly due to the absence of a legal framework that meets modern policing needs and as such Civil Society community completely supports the passage of the Police Reform Bill because the it provides the new legal framework needed to significantly reform the Nigeria Police.
“It is this momentous development of the progress in the review of the Police Act that has raised our hope that, the Bill, if passed by the National Assembly and assented to by the President, will help to address many of the critical challenges and problems plaguing the police as an institution and policing as a process and will change the institutions and culture of colonial police inherited at independence and put in place a new legal framework to push police reform, regulate police conduct and improve welfare and performance.