Policing problems
Five years ago
policemen killed six young Nigerians in the Gimbiya Street area of
Abuja. Up until today, no one has been jailed for their murder.
Shortly before the
start of the World Cup, five staffers at this newspaper left the office
late in the night and were on their way to their places of abode in the
same car. At Ikeja they were stopped by some men of the Nigeria Police
and asked the usual questions. “Who are you?” “Where are you coming
from?” “Where are you going?” “Let us see your papers.” While all their
papers were in order, and their explanations checked out, the policemen
insisted on having them get out of the vehicle, and doing a thorough
search of the car for contraband. Despite not finding anything, the
policemen insisted on going further, and were at that point politely
reminded that they had reached the limits of their jurisdiction. There
and then they became threatening and actually accused one of the
journalists of public disorder for daring to remind them that he has
rights. For some reason (maybe because they were dealing with people
who can make some noise), the journalists were let go.
Imagine if this had happened with an ordinary citizen, at that time of night.
Two days ago, a
policeman killed someone in the Egbeda area of Lagos; over N50 ($0.33)!
You see, the late Kareem like the NEXT journalists from over a month
ago was fed up with routine harassment by the police, and decided not
to give heed to their daily extortion. He died for his impertinence.
People responded and there was a riot. The murderous policeman was
beaten up by the crowd and eventually rescued by his mates who somehow
found 200 of their number to deploy to protect a murderer! Where were
the 200 policemen when Bayo Ohu was murdered close to that area not too
long ago?
You see, one of the big problems we have around these parts is in the very structure of the police- over-centralization.
How does a police
force gather the intel and general community knowledge it requires to
do actual detective work and preempt problems if it is by default seen
as an outside force, and its members are “strangers” to the community,
often not even speaking the local languages. It is very wrong-headed
from the point of results. Of course it looks pretty on paper,
from a “federal character-oriented” and “detribalised Nigeria” point of view.
The solution to the
problems of policing in Nigeria (of many of our problems actually) can
only be solved by community policing. Bringing someone who has lived
all his life in Agbara to suddenly come and start solving crimes in
Ojoto will not make crimes disappear there. Hell, it would probably
cause an increase because he would only be able to use high-handed
methods to enforce law and order. An added advantage of sectional
policing is that a policeman who lives on the street next to you is not
going to kill your children. You know where his are, and if he gets
away with murder.
As regards the
murderers walking our streets in uniform, the level of entrants into
the police force seriously needs to be looked at. You can’t have
someone who makes up laws as he goes along in uniform. That is wrong.
May the souls of Augustina Arebum, Ekene Isaac, Chinedu Meniru,
Tony Nwokike, Paul Ogbonna, Ifeanyi Ozor, Kareem and other victims
of unpunished police violence rest in peace. And more importantly, may
they get justice. Amen.
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