Funding Police Adequately will drastically Address the Issues We Face in The Hands of Police- CLEEN Foundation

Maryam Aminu

The Acting Executive Director, Centre for Law Enforcement Education in Nigeria (CLEEN), Foundation Mrs Ruth Olofin has said that adequate finding for police will drastically address the Issues citizens face in the hands of Police.

Ruth made the statement while delivering her address at the Methodology Workshop on Police Reform Audit held at Abuja yesterday.

She noted that globally, police institutions have come under intense scrutiny, as citizens continue to raise legitimate concerns on the deficit observed in the delivery of their mandate. These are reflected through rights abuse, extortion, torture, oppression, extrajudicial killings, and the use of force beyond permissible levels by police officers.

Sighting the United States, for instance, the Black Lives Matter (BLM), movement was a reaction to a pattern of racially motivated police brutality against unarmed black males. Many parts of the globe experience police brutality in different dimensions thus, informing the need to revisit police service delivery globally and in Nigeria.

In Nigeria, there has also been persistent clamor against police brutality. The detestable activities of the defunct F-SARS operatives led to the ‘ENDSARS’ campaign against police brutality and a national call to disband the unit in 2020. This is following years of bottled-up anger against police high-handedness, extortion, professional misconduct and harrassment that has characterized the operations of personnel of the Nigeria Police Force.

In her words, the CLEEN Foundation is providing leadership to a six-member consortium comprising of the Presidency, NHRC, RULAAC and NOPRIN-all implementing a block of interventions designed to address persistent age-long institutional and attitudinal challenges in the Nigeria Police Force.

Our interventions will create a space for engagement on more effective approaches and robust strategies designed to achieve the reform goal within the Police Force, she assured.

To protect Nigeria’s fragile democracy, enthrone good governance and ensure public safety, there is need to strengthen the capacity of the policing institutions to effectively perform their roles by upholding the tenets of democratic policing and respect for human rights. There is no better time to implement these interventions than now, as we earnestly seek to restore the trust of Nigerians in the Nigeria Police, she added.

“Today’s methodology workshop cannot be successful without your inputs which is why you have all been invited. The role of empirical data in achieving the desired goal of a reformed police cannot be overemphasized. Past efforts targeted at police reform in Nigeria has not yielded much fruit.

“We are convinced that a critical way of solving some of the perennial challenges of policing in Nigeria is by providing research-informed recommendations. The interest lies in the effort of the government and the NPF leadership in aggressively pushing for police reforms in Nigeria in the aftermath of the EndSARS protest, she assured Hence, we are presenting our methodology for this assignment with the view of incorporating your seasoned views and opinion to result in an effective research outcome. This to our commitment to ensuring accountability, rights respecting police service delivery in Nigeria.

Muhammad Tsav, a representative from Nigeria Bar Association stated that reforming the Nigeria Police goes beyond fixing their infrastructure.

Tsav added that there is need for police discipline as they have lost it as a result of the challenges they are facing.

Also speaking,the Deputy Director Investigation Monitoring National Human Right Commission added that for a successful police reform, there is need for adequate funding as well as capacity building- training and retraining of officers.