The Inspector-General of Police, Solomon Arase, in this interview with ADELANI ADEPEGBA, speaks about payment of salaries to promoted personnel, ransom to kidnappers among other issues
What is your take on the call for decentralisation of the police given the security challenges in different parts of the country?
Ordinarily, you would expect that a Commissioner of Police or an Assistant Inspector-General of Police is sufficiently high enough in the hierarchy of police administration to be able to exercise discretion and take decisions without recourse to the Inspector-General of Police office on issues like repair of barracks, offices. They should be able to take some initiatives in doing those things. The Madami Committee Report highlighted this and that report is still there. It was not implemented maybe due to the exigency of the times, but I am a strong advocate that the power should actually devolve to the various regions. It’s something that would be in tandem with international best practices where you restrict the functions of the Inspector-General of Police to what the name connotes- inspection of standards- to make sure that the officers are adhering to standards. It will make for effective policing, it will make for robust policing; so it’s a good thing, I am not averse to it.
What is being done to address the issue of the upsurge in kidnapping in the land?
The Nigerian security space is so vast, the land mass of Nigeria is so vast; you put that side by side with the number of police officers that we have, you’ll realise that policemen cannot be everywhere, which means that the community partnership we have always advocated has to come to play. We expect that people should be sensitive to their environment, they should be able to inform the police whenever they have security challenges. That is the only way to create the synergy between the Nigerian public and security agencies and it’s the panacea to curbing incidences of kidnapping. When you say there is an upsurge, there has been an increase, yes I agree, but against that background, you should know that a lot of them who were engaged otherwise in some other endeavours are now beginning to migrate, but we keep arresting and prosecuting them. The statistics we have is that we have been doing that, we would just continue to make sure that we disrupt them. We don’t allow them to benefit from the proceeds of such criminal enterprises, but at the same time, we would appeal to Nigerians to be extra-vigilant. Sometimes, kidnapping cannot thrive without insider connivance. A family friend was telling me about some hoodlums who told him, “we know that you came back from Dubai yesterday.” How would they have known if not for people around there? I would always urge Nigerians to properly profile their security guards, cooks, drivers before they are engaged. You can’t take your security with levity, so we must be security-conscious.
In most kidnap cases, ransom is usually paid and despite police’s claim that ransom wasn’t paid, the victims often come out to say they paid. Who is the liar between the police and the victim?
We are not saying anybody is a liar; the idea is that you must be privy to something before you can talk about it. I have warned my officers that they should not encourage victims of crimes to pay ransom. It is against all known best practices of law enforcement. Law enforcement officers should not encourage such things because you discover that when you encourage such things, you are surreptitiously saying that there is benefit in crime. We can appreciate the fact that you have a loved one who is out there, there is always that anxiety to get the person released. It is not only the money that ensures the release of the person, the pressure too is involved because the kidnappers are also scared of being caught, they want to get away with the criminal act and evade arrest. But when they discover that the pressure from the police system is on them, sometimes they feel safer releasing their victim than being caught. We have made sufficient progress and we, as a security organisation, are not a public relations outfit, you don’t expect us to come out and beat our chest over every success we record. We are doing what we are supposed to do, preventing crimes and apprehending offenders. So to us, we don’t think we need to stand on the rooftops and eulogise ourselves.
But saying it would increase public confidence in the police.
But the public knows, a lot of Nigerians send me text messages thanking me for the roles the Nigeria Police play in helping them to solve one crime or the other. Not just that but the way they have responded, the way they had conducted themselves, our investigation skills, they do that, and I also expect too that Nigerians should be able to criticise us so that we can work harder.
In the Olu Falae case, what do you think was responsible for his release, is it the ransom or police pressure?
I don’t want to go into that, I think it has been over-flogged; let me not belabour the issue. The important thing I promised Nigerians- I told them that all those people that traumatised the old man would be brought to book- I still stand by that. I will bring them to book, it’s a matter of time. I will always stand by my word that those that were remotely behind the kidnap in one way or the other in traumatising the old man will definitely be brought to book.
Any arrest so far?
That is my operational secret.
Many Nigerians say that sometimes they can’t differentiate between police officers and armed robbers on the highways. Why do policemen sometimes dress like touts? Are you not worried?
I am. You know I said the other time that I banned them from using commercial vehicles. Those categories of officers belong to a special unit, SARS. We have decided in the management that we are going to re-kit them so that you can distinguish them from other people on the street. They should be able to elicit self-confidence and pride instead of putting fear and creating doubts in the minds of the citizens they are meant to serve.
Why are you finding it difficult to enforce the ban on roadblocks? Some of your men are still seen mounting roadblocks and extorting citizens.
There is nothing like that. That is not true. Let me quickly distinguish between roadblocks and ‘stop and search,’ they are two different things. For instance, if you have an intelligence like when there were bombings here and there, you’d lock down the security space so that you could do ‘stop and search.’ That did not amount to roadblock. Roadblock is the complete obstruction of the highway to prevent law-abiding citizens from commuting along the highway, that is what we are talking about.
Are policemen authorised to search motorists’ bags or purses without having any warrant to do so because many of them are fond of doing that?
The powers of the police are enormous. If you reasonably suspect that somebody is carrying an offensive weapon in his bag or car, the law permits you to conduct a search on such a person, vehicle or bags inasmuch as it is done with all amount of civility. I keep saying, our men have to be civil in the conduct of their affairs.
Some Nigerians say that in spite of your best intention, extortion is still a major issue in the police. What steps are you taking to enforce the ‘no bribery’ mantra?
All I have to do is to set up platforms to discourage corruption. All those areas I think would encourage corruption, we try to deal with them. To make fundamental changes: dismantling of the roadblock was done in that light, directing that investigation has to be intelligence-led. Before you arrest somebody and put him in custody, you must have sufficient evidence to know that the person has committed an offence. If you don’t have sufficient evidence and you arrest the person, then you are in breach of what we are saying. I also said you cannot keep a person in custody, pre-trial detention, for more than the constitutionally-accepted time. We have monitoring units and a lot of them are moving out to different places to ensure the enforcement of these directives. Change is one thing that is a bit difficult, you discover that it takes a period of time to teach somebody who is left-handed to use the right hand. We belong to a command structure, they don’t have a choice, they have to obey. We also have punishment platforms. The police force still remains one of the organisations that have a self-cleansing mechanism for dealing with people engaged in malfeasance. So, it is not difficult, they are keying in and we are now using the ‘carrot and stick’ approach, trying to encourage them by putting some welfare things side by side their duties. So, while I am saying you should not do this, I also owe you a duty of care, it is a responsibility for me to cater for your welfare, it’s a dialectical relationship.
These days, police demand for money to do their job, like recovering stolen vehicles or tracking missing persons. Is this the norm?
No, they shouldn’t do things like that, it’s not the norm. That is why we created the anti-bribery platform, http://ift.tt/1HcY2yJ. I watch them in my office, there is a control room here. Nigerians should be patient enough to report their experience. If you are being harassed by a policeman, go to the divisional police officer and report his conduct. If you are not satisfied with the DPO, go to the Area Commander or seek appointment with the Commissioner of Police. You can interface with our platform, all you have to do is to fill in the details and we will get it. We should be patient and should not allow people to abridge our rights, not even policemen in uniform; they are not permitted to do that.
People still accuse the police of torture. Are there no civilised ways of carrying out investigations and extracting information without resorting to brutal manhandling of suspects?
I am glad you used the word, allegations. It still stands within the realm of allegations, they are allegations. Over the years, our relationship with members of the public has been tainted by their perception of who we are. So even if that perception changes, it would still take a long time for Nigerians to know that their own perception has to change about the organisation. Torture is not an investigative tool, it is not acceptable and now with the new administration of Justice Act that is in place, you will discover that torture has no place in our criminal justice system.
Some policemen alleged that they have been promoted without any increment in their salaries. Is there something the IG is not aware of?
Sometimes you do something with the best of intention, but your motives are misrepresented. Somebody who got promoted in the middle of the year cannot get the increment he deserves because these things are budgeted for. By the middle of the year when the promotions came, it is expected that the promotion would enhance their status, to make them happy, to give them hope that they are making career progression. But by the time the promotion came, the budget had been passed, the salaries had been fixed, the cash backing had been put in place, so you have to make projection for the incoming year, for the arrears to be captured. So, that is just the reason and I think they should understand this. If we are promoting you, it was done because we appreciate you that you have done a good job and I want to say ‘thank you.’ I want to motivate you for doing well, but by the time you turn it round to blackmail me, it’s a dis-incentive and I may be discouraged. But it’s their entitlement and anyone who deserves promotion will get it as well as the increments.
So they have the right to complain if they were not paid?
They have the right to complain, but they also have the right to understand that the money is not being withheld, but that as at the time they were being promoted, the money was not budgeted for and you cannot pay money that was not budgeted for.
Policemen say they buy uniforms and kits for themselves. Why should policemen have to buy basic things like uniforms?
It’s due to paucity of funds. The Federal Government has other competing things to deal with in the system; our children want good schools, we need good roads, health care, electricity, pipe-borne water, we want social security, all these things cost money. We are just a sub-set in the system, so we’ll get there.
Somebody tweeted that there would be bombing in Abuja last Friday and it happened. Why wasn’t the police able to prevent it even after the warning?
Oh yes, we saw that (the tweet) and we deployed appropriately, but in the case of asymmetrical warfare, the boundaries between the combatants are not well drawn, that is one area we should be very conscious of. Remember the United Kingdom’s handling of the Northern Ireland crisis, it took such a while. It was supposed to be a straight forward thing but it was protracted because the enemies were not the kind of people you go to a battlefront to meet; they were invisible, they mixed with the community, you don’t know their gender, their mode of movement. All we have to do is psychological re-assurance to show that we are dominating the security space by our presence and ensuring that we are able to deter them. Members of the public, most importantly, should also be vigilant. That is why we came up with that pamphlet on personal security. It was one of the pamphlets that were launched by Mr. President when we had the national security summit and we would make sure as many Nigerians as possible get this document.
Were you able to apprehend the person that sent the tweet?
We are investigating.
Some Abuja residents say they only put their trust in God because they have lost hope that the police can protect them. Have the recent bombings not proved them right?
How can it prove them right? They are Nigerians, they have the right to freedom of movement, freedom to do what they want to do. If you watch most films on terrorism, what they try to do is to instil fear in the minds of the populace and to put the government in a bad light, like they are not capable of protecting the people. It’s part of their psychological operations to say they are winning the war. They have been sufficiently degraded in the North-East, so this is just dispersal of the remnants and we are discussing that. All of us put our trust in God, but then, we should also protect ourselves and also trust in our police force and other security agencies.
One of the challenges facing the police is ageing infrastructure. So, how do you intend to tackle the infrastructure deficit in the force, particularly the dilapidated state of police colleges and barracks?
I think I have answered that question before. I talked about paucity of funds and contending demands on the government. At the same time, we also know that the federal and state governments cannot do it alone: corporate organisations, well-meaning individuals should be able to come to the aid of the Nigeria Police Force. They have done it sufficiently well in Lagos; Lagos Trust Fund is a very good initiative by the Tinubu/Fashola administration and it has been inherited by Governor Ambode and we are expanding on it and other state governments are trying to replicate the initiative. It has to be private/public sector mix because business people require a safe and secure environment to do their business and make their profit. So, to whom much is given, much is expected.
Most VIPs still retain their police escorts while ordinary citizens are out there without protection. Why is this so?
That is a malicious allegation. There are some categories of people who are entitled to police in the country, but even then, we have scaled down their police escorts tremendously. The era of someone having a truck-load of policemen as escorts is gone, we don’t even have the men to give to anybody. So that allegation is not true, and my directive (on withdrawal of police escort) is being enforced. There is always an avalanche of requests every day for police escorts, but we politely turn them down, but we still ensure that the security space is maintained.
The issue of siren has not been effectively addressed. You seem unable to stop the abuse of siren by so-called VIPs.
It is about individual preferences; governors, some members of the National Assembly are entitled to siren, it’s attached to their office; the use of it is discretional. I, as the IG, feel it’s a nuisance for me to be using siren. If I am talking about community partnership, that people should come and give me information, I should not be driving them away from the street. So, I am always very conscious and I tell my men, “you can flash your light, but don’t disturb the public,” so we are enforcing it. Nigerians are nice people, they will obey the law if it’s properly implemented.
Farmers in the south are complaining that Fulani herdsmen would destroy their lands, kill their colleagues and when they report at the station, nothing is done. Are the police not tacitly encouraging brigandage by the herdsmen?
No, you should be able to distinguish between criminals who are infringing on peoples’ space and law-abiding herdsmen who go about their duties. There are a lot of law-abiding herdsmen out there. So when you lump them together, you miss the point. Your argument now becomes centrifugal; you are raising those issues that are capable of causing tension within our system. We should be able to distinguish between those criminals who engage in kidnapping and all those things and those law-abiding herdsmen who graze their cattle from place to place. When you lump everybody together, you are engaging in ‘we against them,’ which is not good for our system.
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