Decentralize Police Now!!
With the #ENDSARS protests almost behind us, we need to focus on how best to restructure the police department to not only improve its effectiveness, but to develop a system that will work for our country. From all practical perspectives, the current talks by the police elite will not get us to where we need to or should be in terms of setting up an effective police apparatus to improve security in the country.
Let me begin by saying that President Buhari got it wrong when he insinuated that the states do not have enough resources to fund a functional state police. For starters, the police department just like police all over the world should work at being self-sustaining with minimal assistance from the federal or state governments, but that is a discussion for another time.
FG Set Up Group to Discuss Police Decentralization.
I was elated to learn that the Nigerian federal government did set up a committee to discuss how best to decentralize the police. However, the makeup of the committee leaves much to be desired. From a common-sense perspective, it may seem prudent to put together a group of current security personnel to carry out this objective, however, and given their vested interest and potential to protect their personal interests, you can see how this will become an exercise in futility. Personally, I do believe this group will be biased and will not be the group that will successfully implement a true decentralization of the Nigerian police.
To be effective, our federal government should populate this committee with individuals from all major geo-political zones, individuals who understand the functioning of a true federalism, and persons to protect the interest of the state and local governments. Most importantly, we must include individuals with no vested interest in whether the police department is centralized or decentralized to balance any bias that will come from current members of the police force. To that end, having police knowledge or experience of the current state of the Nigerian police, while important, does not necessarily make you an expert with setting up successful decentralized police system. To the contrary, it may bias your opinion since you are fully cognizant that there may be potential negative consequences, to the individual if police is truly and effectively decentralized.
Now, decentralizing our police force does not necessarily mean dismantling our current apparatus and setting up a new order. It should simply involve devolving to a “Community Policing” structure that will be as close to the masses as possible. It should be a structure that emphasizes security of the local, state, and federal areas, and in that order. I emphasize this knowing that our current judicial set up recognizes the existence of different legal systems that may exist in different states. Whereas, some Northern states do incorporate the Sharia laws in their localities working side by side with conventional judicial laws, other states and local government often defer to their traditional means of settling disputes such as land disputes, divorce and other small civil matters. Care must be taken to ensure that a new police setup will recognize and respect these age-old method of dispute resolutions in any quest to decentralization. It is imperative that we think that deeply about our systems to make sure no constituencies are left out. So, what would it take to set up a fully functional and successful decentralized police force? Here are some of my thoughts.
Multi-Tier Police Force.
There are several examples of decentralized police forces all over the world that we could and should study to get to what will serve us the most. The key here is to try to emulate those systems which closely emulate and fit the kind of dichotomy and diversity that exists in Nigeria.
Any police force in Nigeria should have three or more tiers to be effective. Globally, there should exist federal, state, and local government police. Additionally, just like in other civilized countries, there should exist specialization within the tiers and staffed with persons specializing in handling specific aspects of security challenges. For example, there should exist within the police departments, a traffic division, a homicide division, a civil division and possibly a SWAT team and all, although under one umbrella, should maintain some elements of autonomy. One thing should be clear, the prisons must be totally divested from the police department and should function under their own rules of engagements and autonomy.
The above will serve to ensure that our police force has specialization within them, instead of our current jack-of-all trade police officers with little or no knowledge about the laws they are charged to enforce. In essence, if there is crime, the patrol officers should be the first to the scene with the sole role of securing the scene for criminal or homicide officers to arrive and take over the investigation. Once the appropriate division of the force shows up, the patrol officers should move on to their patrol roles. It is that simple.
Devolving our police will serve bring the police closer to the people they are paid to protect. This alone may help eliminates the appearance of “us and them” mentality currently pervasive in the country. As culturally diverse as we are, our police departments and personnel must be cognizant of our local traditions and norms to ensure they do not run afoul of those and run the risk of losing the support of their communities. That is what community policing is all about and it has been established in various parts of the world with great successes and is the cornerstone for solving crimes in some areas.
Like mentioned earlier, the police should never be in charge of the jails and/or prison systems. This set up is a recipe for abuse, which in the case of Nigeria, has been well documented. The police should not have any role with setting bail, and/or determining how long to keep someone in jail. That role should be reserved for the courts. The correctional or prison authorities should operate under their own set of rules, totally separate from the police department, and with state or federal oversight.
It is imperative that the federal, state, and local police force be independent and autonomous of one another. This does not mean they do not work together and/or share resources whenever warranted. It simply means that the federal police should not dictate to the state or local police and the state police do not dictate to the local police either. Since our constitution clearly spells out our “individual” rights, the federal government, through our federal judicial system, should monitor and prosecute any civil rights violations.
Decentralizing our police must include independence and autonomy from the Governor’s office, or that of any elected officials. Police should be there to serve and protect the taxpayers and not serve at the whims of our elected officials. This is particularly important, given the penchant of our elected officials to abuse their authorities. If we do not divest the control of the police from our elected officials, I will bet that they will becomes tools deployed by these politicians to torment, harass and intimidate their rivals at any given opportunity. Just like in the US and other nations, police attaché to any governors, senators or VIPs should be stripped of any arresting authority. Their role should be limited to protecting the person they are charges to protect, and that is if we do not do away with our police guarding these elected officials and VIPs.
Funding A Decentralized Police.
Buhari was right to be concerned that states may not be able to financially support state police. While it may be necessary for the federal government to help these state and local government in the initial set up of a decentralized police apparatus. However, it will be incumbent of the various states and local governments to develop a method, either through its federal allocations or other means of internally generated revenue sources to fund their own security apparatus. It is about time our states begin to wean themselves off the purse of the federal government for every nuanced need of the states. I am not advocating that federal support should stop, just putting the masses on notice that our security and wellbeing now depends on us all as individuals and civic citizens. My point is that, the business of government under a presidential system as practiced in Nigeria, is expensive and until we develop better ways of generating enough revenue to effectively fund that system of government, we will always lag behind the rest of the world in development and progress.
For more articles, visit www.nairandkobo.com and leave me a comment.
Comentarios