New Telegraph

It’s time for State Police –Ohanaeze, PANDEF, others tell FG

Nigeria’s main ethnic nationalities have once again taken a swipe at the Nigerian Constitution and said it is not workable as is obsolete.

 

The Pan-Yoruba socio political organization Afenifere, its main apex Igbo counterpart, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Pan Niger Delta Forum (PANDEF), as well as the Middle Belt Forum, spoke in separate reactions to a spat between Governor Babajide Sanwo – Olu of Lagos State and a Chief Superintendent of Police (CSP) who led a team of policemen to enforce a Supreme Court judgment in favour of land owners in Magodo Phase II Estate.

 

The policemen, who came from Abuja, were at the Estate to forcefully enforce the judgment and the area was in turmoil. The CSP refused to obey Sanwo-Olu, who asked the leader of the team to vacate the place. He said he was sent there by Abuja and that he would not take the governor’s orders.

 

In different interviews with Sunday Telegraph, the ethnic nationalities said that the CSP’s action was disrespectful to the governor, the Chief Security Officer (CSO) of his State.

 

When contacted, the Pan Yoruba socio-political organisation, Afenifere, expressed disappointment in the position of President Muhammadu Buhari on the issue of State Police. Buhari had spoken against state police in his interview with Channels Television.

 

According to Afenifere’s National Publicity Secretary, Comrade Jare Ajayi, the president’s position on this and some other matters has clearly shown that those in the corridors of power were not in touch with the reality on ground. Ajayi said that at the best of time, Nigeria ought to have a policing system that truly reflects its federal nature.

 

The need to have a multi-layer Police system is even more imperative now in view of the undesirable level to which insecurity has fallen in the country today, according to him. Ohanaeze Ndigbo condemned the manner the CSP disrespected Governor Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State over the Magodo land dispute in Lagos. National Publicity Secretary, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Chief Alex Ogbonnia, in an interview with one of our  said such disdainful treatment of governors, CSOs of their states by the police only reinforces the call for the establishment of State police.

 

Also, he said that the call for the establishment of the state police however is not to confront or undermine the federal police but to complement the efforts of the federal police seeing that the rising crime wave in the country seems to have overwhelmed them.

 

Ogbonnia said: “The behaviour of the police officer was unethical; it falls short of the standard expected in the relationship between the police officer and the Chief Security Officer of the state. “It has become clear that the inability of the Nigerian Police to contain the rising crime wave in Nigeria and it has become necessary for the president to understand that state security architecture is required to complement the efforts of the federal police. We are talking about the state police now; it is to complement the efforts of the federal police.

 

“We are not advocating scrapping the entire federal police. We are talking about something like, you know in the Igbo social organization, the political administration in Igbo land is structured along family, hamlets, villages and towns; and each has leadership.

 

“The indigenous Igbo political system we have what we call collective responsibility in the community, which is what we call security. If you say security is a collective responsibility, the implication is that the social network of all these people at all the levels will help in ensuring security in a given jurisdiction.

 

“So, when we talk about complimenting the federal police, it’s a way of the inhabitants of a given jurisdiction to support the security architecture; that’s what they call the state police or ‘Ebubeagu’ and others.

 

“But what has become clear is that the federal police cannot contain the crime wave in Nigeria and it requires a sort of complimentary support”.

 

The Middle Belt Front (MBF) on its own wants the Federal Government to embrace State Police as it is done in other climes. National President, MBF Dr. Pitris Pogu, observed that state police is an imperative and regrets that the Federal Government has demonstrated its inability to provide security for the Nigerian citizenry as its primary responsibility.

 

He said: “In federalism, State Police is an imperative. The American system works that way and all other Federalist states all over the world, except Nigeria operates that way.

 

“In our peculiar situation, the non performing Federal Government that has failed to provide adequate security for the people as a primary mandate should be the advocate of state police if the leadership is sincere. May God help Nigeria and give us leaders that love Nigeria and Nigerians.” Also weighing in, National Publicity Secretary, Pan Niger Delta Forum (PANDEF), Ken Robinson, condemned President Muhammadu Buhari’s unbelief in State Police.

 

Robinson said: “He is self-centered and egoistic; reason being that the presidency and the president benefit from the president’s faulty system where you appoint an Inspector General of Police and then appoint commissioners of police in the various states and they take orders from the president through the Inspector General of Police.

 

“It is what the inspector general of police and the president want them to do that they will do and they simply disregard the democratically elected governors who are supposed to be the chief security officers of their various states.

 

“They disregard their orders. In fact, they don’t have a direct relationship with them. They tell them they get orders from Abuja and we cannot continue to run a country like this. “We have operated this system for all these years and it has not worked. It rather created problems for us.

 

And so, we need to change this system. The Nigeria security architecture is archaic, obsolete and it is analogue. And it has no place anywhere. It can’t take care of today’s challenges and even yesterday’s challenges.

 

“It couldn’t take care of them. So, we need to change the system. We need to open up the system. Look at the recent situation in Lagos where the governor of Lagos gave order, it was a public disgrace by a police officer who said that he got orders from Abuja and the governor of the state could be so treated and this kind of situation can cause very chaotic happenings and citizens of those states could react. “How can you treat someone that is supposed to be the chief security officer of a state in that manner?

 

And that is what happens across the country and so this command and control system from Abuja across the 36 states of Nigeria is not helping security matters and it is one of the reasons why the security situation is getting worse across all parts of the country even there in Abuja.

 

“PANDEF is calling on all patriotic Nigerians particularly in the National Assembly to also add their voices and insist that they must open up the security architecture.

 

Beyond the state police, we should even have local government and community police as it is obtained in other democratic countries across the world. “It is not about changing service chiefs.

 

Even if we change service chiefs every two months, we will still have these security challenges because it is not about the person, it is about the system that is not working and until that system is changed, we won’t get security issues right.” Sola Adeyemo, Kenneth Ofoma, Cephas Iorhemen and Pauline Onyibe Nigeria’s main ethnic nationalities have once again taken a swipe at the Nigerian Constitution and said it is not workable as is obsolete.

 

The Pan-Yoruba socio political organization Afenifere, its main apex Igbo counterpart, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Pan Niger Delta Forum (PANDEF), as well as the Middle Belt Forum, spoke in separate reactions to a spat between Governor Babajide Sanwo – Olu of Lagos State and a Chief Superintendent of Police (CSP) who led a team of policemen to enforce a Supreme Court judgment in favour of land owners in Magodo Phase II Estate. The policemen, who came from Abuja, were at the Estate to forcefully enforce the judgment and the area was in turmoil.

 

The CSP refused to obey Sanwo-Olu, who asked the leader of the team to vacate the place.

 

He said he was sent there by Abuja and that he would not take the governor’s orders. In different interviews with Sunday Telegraph, the ethnic nationalities said that the CSP’s action was disrespectful to the governor, the Chief Security Officer (CSO) of his State. When contacted, the Pan Yoruba socio-political organisation, Afenifere, expressed disappointment in the position of President Muhammadu Buhari on the issue of State Police. B

uhari had spoken against state police in his interview with Channels Television. According to Afenifere’s National Publicity Secretary, Comrade Jare Ajayi, the president’s position on this and some other matters has clearly shown that those in the corridors of power were not in touch with the reality on ground. Ajayi said that at the best of time, Nigeria ought to have a policing system that truly reflects its federal nature.

 

The need to have a multi-layer Police system is even more imperative now in view of the undesirable level to which insecurity has fallen in the country today, according to him.

 

Ohanaeze Ndigbo condemned the manner the CSP disrespected Governor Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State over the Magodo land dispute in Lagos. National Publicity Secretary, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, Chief Alex Ogbonnia, in an interview with one of our correspondents in Enugu, Onyekachi Eze ABUJA

 

 

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has disowned the statement credited to former Niger State Governor, Dr. Muazu Babangida Aliyu, that it has zoned its presidential ticket to the north. Aliyu had said on Friday, while receiving the Atiku Support Organisation (ASO), that PDP has “agreed to rezone it (the presidency) to the North as requested by others but we have agreed, written and openly as a result of what has happened that any candidate from any part of the country can now contest this election.” But the PDP in a statement by National Publicity Secretary,

 

Debo Ologunagba, said such comment was “misleading as it does not in any way represent the position of our party. “For the avoidance of doubt, the PDP emphatically and unequivocally states that it has not zoned its presidential ticket to any part of the country.”

The statement added that PDP is a political party founded on democratic principles, adding that every of its action, including zoning, “is based on extensive consultations, discussions and consideration of all the issues as well as the various tendencies and interests across the nation, with the main objective of ensuring that the unity, peaceful co-existence and development of our nation are reinforced and promoted.”

 

The party urged Nigerians, its members and supporters to disregard the unfounded zoning claims as being peddled. It warned Aliyu and those behind the claims to desist forthwith.

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