In recent times the Police and other security agencies in Nigeria and the manner of their operation have come under the searchlight of the critical segment of the Nigerian polity. Among the issues that have brought negative publicity to the Nigeria Police today are the failed coup attempt in Anambra State (which was led by an Assistant Inspector General of Police with a detachment of over two hundred mobile policemen), the allegations of massive fraud and extortion against the highest authorities in the Nigeria Police as well as a recent report that junior officers in a particular Police Command in a nearby state carried placards to protest the exorbitant returns that were being demanded of them daily. Nigerians are all too familiar with the daily extortion of motorists on our roads - at regular check points and illegal road blocks. Many times drivers or conductors have allegedly been short dead for refusing or delaying to pay the illegal toll demanded by gun-totting officers on the road. I will like to quote a letter written by a student of Obafemi Awolowo University and published in today’s Guardian Newspaper. It reads:

The other day I travelled from Lagos to Ile-Ife. The show of shame I witnessed made my heart bleed for this nation and our police force. Between Lagos and Ile-Ife we passed through 20 checkpoints (the President consistently tells us that such checkpoints are illegal) and at each one of them the driver was held at gunpoint and forced to part with N20.00 In fact at one of the points along new Ife road, the drivers were told to park, and go to meet a man sitting in a jeep … who seemed to be a high ranking officer, to “deliver” their N20 most respectfully.

We the passengers had to pay double of what we used to pay for fares due to this singular reason. If the Nigeria Police Force is really serious about removing bad eggs in its fold, this brazen act of daylight robbery must be squarely addressed. Let it not be that only an officer who has “overdone” his own will be probed and may be disciplined. If the leadership of the force is sincere about its resolve to stop this highly disgraceful act of daylight robbery, then let decisive actions be taken.

Apart from the widespread extortion that is associated with the Police and other security agencies in this country, the agencies often operate like an aberrant order, intimidating, coercing and brutalising Nigerian citizens in total disregard of all constitutional provisions regarding the limits of their powers or the rights of citizens. There has not been any marked difference in operational style between the Colonial Police Force that was put together for the sole purpose of subjugating the Nigerian people or coercing them into submission, and the post-Independence Nigerian Police. Perhaps no conscious efforts have been made since independence to transform the Nigerian Police into a civil agency that is aimed at maintaining order and protecting lives and property. Thus, for the slightest misdemeanour they often deal with "bloody civilians" in the bloodiest manner. At Police Stations, at public functions, and at regular checkpoints or emergency roadblocks, they are known to have harassed, extorted, brutalised and tortured innocent Nigerians mercilessly. What is more, trigger happy police officers are alleged to have often shot innocent people and framed up charges of armed robbery against their dead victims in order to escape the law.

One only needs to see the Mobile Squad or the Anti-Riot Police at work to recognise that perhaps they are not trained to keep the law, but rather to “kill and go.”  They have often deployed tanks and armoured personnel carriers and used live bullets to suppress students demonstrations or the peaceful demonstration of workers on the occasion of a labour strike. Security agents who accompany rich men and women or top government officials in escort vehicles,  and those of who accompany cash carrying bullion vans, are often armed with guns, clubs and horsewhips, with which they whip and bash fellow citizens out of the road. The recklessness with which they drive their siren-blaring vehicles, and the brute force and bravado with which they send other road users off the highway whenever they are passing, constitute nothing but a reign of terror. This is why in the perception of many Nigerians, the Police Officer is far from being “your friend.” This is perhaps why the younger segment of our society have come to see the police as their foremost enemy.

One of the most fundamental responsibilities of government is the protection of lives and property and the safeguarding of law and order in society. The police is the principal agent for carrying out this important responsibility of state. Yet there must be certain laws and regulations that guide the conduct of the police. In Nigeria, what are the rights and limitations of the Police? What are the rights and limitations of the citizen before the police? There are numerous international conventions regarding the fundamental human rights of suspects, who must be presumed innocent until they are proven guilty through the due process of law. So which law permits the Nigerian police to parade mere suspects before TV cameras as we see everyday in our country? Which law permits the police to kill criminal suspects or those alleged to be armed robbers? Which law permits the officers and men of the regular Police Force who mount road blocks to harass or brutalise over vehicle particulars? Which law permits a military officer, a government official or a cash carrying bank chief to force other road users off the public highway with sirens, guns and horsewhips?

The conduct of our Police Officers in Nigeria, has not only legal but also implications for us. To whatever extent the allegations against officers of the Nigeria Police are correct, there are ethical or moral issues that are involved in the intimidation and extortion of innocent Nigerians. There are ethical or moral issues involved in the brutalisation of Nigerians by our security agencies. There are ethical or moral issues involved in the widespread privatisation of the police by rich Nigerians or Nigerians holding political office at a particular time. What are these ethical or moral imperatives? How shall we overcome the present perceived state of anomie and immorality in the conduct of the Nigeria Police. These are the issues to be reflected upon by our main presenter today.

March 2003