Nigeria’s Policing System Has Failed Woefully – Ekweremadu

Joining calls for state police, a former Deputy President of the
Senate, Ike Ekweremadu, said in Lagos on Monday that Nigeria’s
policing system had failed to tackle insecurity.

Speaking on “Nigerian State and the Call for Restructuring’’ at
the opening of Law Week 2021 of the Ikeja branch of the Nigerian
Bar Association (NBA) Ekweremadu called for the decentralisation of
the police.

The Week has “The Nigeria of Our Dreams’’ as its theme.

Ekweremadu said the decentralisation of the police had become
expedient in the face of rising wave of banditry and kidnapping
across the country.

“Our policing system has failed woefully. There are no other
federating states that have done what we are doing in policing.

“It is no surprise that with the capsizing of the national
police, the nation’s security has also collapsed,’’ he said.

Ekweremadu said that restructuring the police was no longer a
matter of choice but a matter of urgency.

“In an instance where we have a decentralised police, we will
have a federal police system and 774 police systems in all the 774
local governments in the 36 states and in Abuja.

“The implication, therefore, is that if the federal police fail,
we have additional layers in 36 states; but right now, they are
absent.

“Now that the federal policing have collapsed because they do
not have the resources, the funding and the manpower, there is
nothing to hold on to, Ekweremadu stressed.

In his address of welcome, Mr Bartholomew Aguegbodo, Chairman of
the NBA branch said there was no better time to hold the Law Week
than now in the light of Nigeria’s current political climate.

“Sometime in 2004 or 2005 the then President Olusegun Obasanjo,
set up a committee with the task of setting a national vision
targeted at year 2020 with all the dreams and hopes.

“The year 2020 has come and gone and the dreams are far from
being realised.

“The founding fathers of this country had policies which would
have birthed the Nigeria of our dreams if we had followed them to
the letter,’’ he said.

Aguegbodo said bad leadership and tribalism had, unfortunately,
derailed the objectives of the nation’s founding fathers and set
the nation backward. (NAN)

Joining calls for state police, a former Deputy President of the
Senate, Ike Ekweremadu, said in Lagos on Monday that Nigeria’s
policing system had failed to tackle insecurity.

Speaking on “Nigerian State and the Call for Restructuring’’ at
the opening of Law Week 2021 of the Ikeja branch of the Nigerian
Bar Association (NBA) Ekweremadu called for the decentralisation of
the police.

The Week has “The Nigeria of Our Dreams’’ as its theme.

Ekweremadu said the decentralisation of the police had become
expedient in the face of rising wave of banditry and kidnapping
across the country.

“Our policing system has failed woefully. There are no other
federating states that have done what we are doing in policing.

“It is no surprise that with the capsizing of the national
police, the nation’s security has also collapsed,’’ he said.

Ekweremadu said that restructuring the police was no longer a
matter of choice but a matter of urgency.

“In an instance where we have a decentralised police, we will
have a federal police system and 774 police systems in all the 774
local governments in the 36 states and in Abuja.

“The implication, therefore, is that if the federal police fail,
we have additional layers in 36 states; but right now, they are
absent.

“Now that the federal policing have collapsed because they do
not have the resources, the funding and the manpower, there is
nothing to hold on to, Ekweremadu stressed.

In his address of welcome, Mr Bartholomew Aguegbodo, Chairman of
the NBA branch said there was no better time to hold the Law Week
than now in the light of Nigeria’s current political climate.

“Sometime in 2004 or 2005 the then President Olusegun Obasanjo,
set up a committee with the task of setting a national vision
targeted at year 2020 with all the dreams and hopes.

“The year 2020 has come and gone and the dreams are far from
being realised.

“The founding fathers of this country had policies which would
have birthed the Nigeria of our dreams if we had followed them to
the letter,’’ he said.

Aguegbodo said bad leadership and tribalism had, unfortunately,
derailed the objectives of the nation’s founding fathers and set
the nation backward. (NAN)