State police can be seen
as a body of police unique to each state, having state wide authority to
conduct law enforcement activities and criminal investigations. The concept of
state policing is not a new phenomenon in Nigeria as it has been widely
suggested as one of the best channel to handle crimes and insecurity situation
of the country.
The idea of state
policing has gained popularity as a result of the surge in the rate of highly
sophisticated crimes in the country and the inability of the federal police
command to contain the challenges. The introduction of state police into
Nigerian policing system has been widely suggested as the only solution for the
curbing of the incessant security conundrum in the country.
It is believed that the closeness of the state
police to the society of its jurisdiction places it in more proactive position
for the detecting and uprooting of any emerging crime before it grows. However,
there is an opinion which insists that state police will lead to a situation in
which there will be two rivaling institutions of the same responsibility, duty
and nature in the country. This is mainly the opinion of the antagonists of
state police. Nevertheless, the
protagonists of the state police maintain that the creation of state police is
the only solution to all Nigeria’s security challenges, given the acquaintance
of the institution with the people and the terrain. Any Nigerian who inhibits
an iota of sense of responsibility ought to be vociferously engaged in this
debate as the presence of security and its absence thereof affects us all.
For the purpose of
enforcement the Nigeria Legal System
operates a centralized Police set-up, called
the Nigerian Police Force(NPF) which its operational control is in the hands
of the Inspector General of Police Force, who in turn, is answerable to
the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Then the order of authority
flows from there down to the naive constable.
There exists a popular
school of thought clamouring for the maintenance of the status quo, as the fear
of the unknown is a veritable roadside sign for caution going forward. One
major reason the antagonists reject the idea of the establishment of state
police in Nigeria is that nothing has changed in the condition that led to the
demise of native police in the first instance. It should be recalled that the
native police of Nigeria’s first republic was a most abused public institution. Native police
in Pre 1966 Nigeria
symbolized the possession of absolute
power by local
authorities which was recklessly used
by politicians of
that era for
selfish political gains.
In both the Northern and Western Regions, politicians freely utilized
native police to oppress political opponents and rig elections. Moreso, there
is the latent fear that operating multiple police forces in the country would
rather worsen the police experience of the citizenry as it is likely that the
establishment of individual state police apparatuses will be based on current
Nigeria Police Force traditions, thus, giving an already dangerous animal
additional heads. In the same vein, there is the issue of funding. With
virtually all the states depending on allocation from the centre, questions are
being asked about how states with low IGR would come up with the funding of and
sustenance of such an outfit as the police.
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