Unlike the situation twelve years ago when the issue of state police divided Nigeria Governors Forum right down the middle, there appears today to be a more ready acceptance of the idea. Many Nigerians want us to move forward from the present situation of a single, federal police force to a dual, separate state and federal police forces with separate command structures and, if possible, clearly demarcated responsibilities.
Let me correct myself here; move backwards is more like it. Up until the late 1960s, we had in this country a local police force in each Native Authority [known in the North as Yan Doka, literally “sons of order”] and a federal Nigeria Police known in the North as Yan Sanda, literally “sons of baton.” Policemen in those days rode on bicycles and carried batons, unlike today, when each one of them has a rifle, sometimes a machine gun and they ride around in armoured personnel carriers, but are still unable to stem crime as effectively as the Yan Doka did.
Although there appears to be wider support today for the state police idea, there are still several K-legs that I see with the current push to amend the 1999 Constitution and enshrine the idea. One K-leg is the timing, when general and presidential elections are looming. Only four years ago, then presidential candidate Bola Tinubu was very unhappy when the Buhari Administration approved the Central Bank’s plan to change the currency on the eve of elections. It caused massive economic and social disruption; splitting Nigeria Police at this time is likely to cause at least as much disruption. Pray, why not wait until the election is over, and then you have all the time in the world to plan this tumultuous change?
The opposition Africa Democratic Congress [ADC] has already decried what it called the rush rush manner in which the police reform is being pushed. The Presidency had set up a committee that studied the idea and made recommendations. In the olden days, such a committee’s report would have been published in the newspapers, together with a government White Paper that will say which recommendations were accepted and which ones were rejected or modified. In the days of military rule, when there was no Parliament, the soldiers relied a lot on published committee reports and white papers to get public reaction and input. White Papers on everything from Langalanga train disaster to plane crashes to communal riots to student disturbances were readily published in the newspapers in those days.
Even though the state police idea appears to have gained ready support from Presidency, state governors and National Assembly, the Presidency hurriedly sent a constitutional amendment bill to the National Assembly and, in one day, the Senate passed it. There were no public hearings. This is very important because there are many other stakeholders in this police reform project, as well as a lot of Nigerians who can make critical inputs into this matter.
For example, twenty-five years ago when I was Editor of New Nigerian in Kaduna, this matter of the relative efficiency between the old Yan Doka and the present Yan Sanda once came up. We thought one person who will have a rich perspective of the matter was Walin Kano Alhaji Mahe Bashir Wali. In the 1960s he was the Wakilin Doka [i.e. head of the Kano Native Authority Police], and after the police reforms, he transferred to Nigeria Police and rose to become Deputy Inspector General. Our Features Editor Auwalu Umar Danbatta went and interviewed him in Kano. He asked Wali why the Yan Doka were more effective in combatting crime than the Yan Sanda, and Wali said population explosion is a factor. Our villages and towns were once relatively small, and anyone entering a village must report to the Village Head, introduce himself, say where he was coming from, what his business in the town was, who is hosting him, and when and where he will go from there. These days, when some of our state capitals and largest cities have hundreds of hotels, plus the constitutional freedom of movement, one can enter any town he likes, lodge in a hotel for as long as he wants, transact any business he likes and depart at his own time without telling anybody.
Not only has Nigerian society quantitatively increased in population, but it has also qualitatively transformed in criminal sophistication, up to and including the coming of armed robbers, kidnappers, insurgents, bandits, Yahoo boys and secessionists. Nigeria Police, with all its phenomenal increase in manpower, much larger budgets, much more mobility, more sophisticated domestic and foreign training, heavier weapons and greater use of tech gadgets, is still at its wits end combatting crime. Will state police be better in this regard?
One advantage that state police is touted to have, in relation to the Federal police, is better knowledge of the locality. It is assumed when state police come on board, every state will staff it with locals, what we call indigenes. Certainly that will help in some ways, even though there are other ways in which Nigeria Police could gain this knowledge of the locality too, by incorporating traditional rulers and local vigilantes into the scheme. That you are a local native alone does not give you exceptional knowledge of the criminals in the area. Which is why, state police forces must still aim to build intelligence capacities like Nigeria Police currently has, plus the assistance it gets from intelligence and security agencies and the military. The late Marafan Sokoto Alhaji Umaru Shinkafi, a career policeman who once headed the Nigeria Security Organisation [NSO], precursor of today’s DSS, NIA and DIA, throughout his lifetime emphasized the centrality of intelligence gathering in fighting crime. Which is why, conferences being held in his memory today are called Umaru Shinkafi Intelligence and Security Summit.
Stuffing state police with locals will have its advantages but it might also have some K-legs as well. Every state in Nigeria has its own share of ethnic, religious, political and traditional disputes. Native policemen can easily be sucked into these, unless if they receive training and indoctrination so sophisticated that they rise above these, which is doubtful. Can a nine month training at a Police Academy wipe out ethnic and other sentiment? One reason for worry is that in many inter communal disputes across the country, ex-servicemen often play a central role, wielding firearms to fight for their communities. If even military training is unable to erase such sentiments, is it likely that state police training can do so?
It is not for nothing that policemen, including Commissioners of Police, are posted around the country, usually outside their own states of origin, but usually also to areas of cultural similarity, to enhance understanding. Look, in the long years of military rule in this country, Military Governors were almost never sent to their states of origin. That at least guaranteed some neutrality, or the appearance of it, in local disputes. Imagine when a communal dispute arises and the state police DPO is a native of one of the warring communities. However much he strives to remain neutral, the opposing community will never agree, and will loudly allege that he took sides with his native community.
The biggest fear around the state police idea is that state governors could abuse it by lending it to their partisan causes. Even now, some governors have been alleged to goad federal security officials to arrest and detain their political opponents, to deny them freedom of movement and assembly, and to intimidate anyone who supports an opposition party. Imagine what will happen if a state governor appoints the Commissioner of State Police, fully funds the force and can initiate the Compol’s removal.
One telling example is how State Independent Electoral Commissions have become the institutional sick babies of this Republic. In nearly every state where SIECs conducted local government elections, the ruling party in the state swept every available seat. Some people who are wary of the state police idea fear that, given the secessionist sentiment in some areas, state police could become tools in such bids. What we can say here however is that since we will still have a single, federal military force, that should be able to combat any such tendencies.
Let me also advise the Presidency; please do not over hype the notion that creating state police will overnight, or even in the short or medium term, end the scourge of insecurity currently bedeviling the country. Just like we are agitating for local police nearly 60 years after we abolished them, somewhere down the road Nigerians may agitate for a return to single Federal Police.
So, by all means let us go forth [to the past] and try the state police idea, but please seek greater input from all sectors of Nigerian society, not just governors and MPs, but especially from current and ex-servicemen. And then, please wait until after the 2027 election before you begin to split police forces.