EDITORIAL: Arresting defiance to Tinubu’s police withdrawal order

Designs to negate the recent presidential directive that police officers attached to very important personalities (VIPs) as security details should be withdrawn with immediate effect, and redeployed to core police duties to enhance the protection of the larger society, are obvious. Sadly, the culprits are officers of the Police Force itself, members of Nigeria’s political establishment, and the so-called celebrities. This is certainly outrageous.

Join the Premium Times WhatsApp Community For Quick Access To News and Happenings Around You.

Open in WhatsApp

The order, given on 23 November during President Bola Tinubu’s meeting with service chiefs, was followed by the declaration of a state of emergency on national security. Any weak enforcement of this order will give a fillip to the escalating insecurity in the country.

Following the kidnapping rampage of bandits that involved over 400 citizens, mostly students and teachers from schools in Kebbi and Niger states, as well as worshippers in a church in Kwara State, within a week in November, anxiety and confusion enveloped the nation. Consequently, to have more security personnel on the ground to protect lives and properties was considered imperative, given that swathes of Nigerian territories are under the effective control of non-state actors.

Regrettably, indiscipline in the Police Force has shown up more defiantly since 23 November, when the president gave the order. Hence, on 6 December, the police set up “a special enforcement team to monitor and ensure total adherence to the presidential directive.” This is an apparent indictment of the Force, especially the Inspector-General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, under whose leadership this is unravelling.

Stay Ahead with Premium Times

Add as a preferred source on Google

In clear terms, it is an admission of failure to comply with an order that was supposed to take “immediate effect.” An ensuing memo from The Special Protection Unit and the head of the Policing Monitoring Unit underscored this. Officers were ordered to report back to their base before the end of work on 24 November, and to attend a compulsory parade the following day, during which attendance would be taken through a nominal roll call to ensure compliance.

The flinch began when IGP Egbetokun announced the withdrawal of 11,566 police officers attached to VIPs at a press conference, with the impression that this was the total number of officers affected. But PREMIUM TIMES disputed this claim, against the backdrop of the well-publicised over 100,000 officers deployed for VIP protection gigs.

The European Union Agency for Asylum, in its 11 November report on the numerical strength of the police, referenced this latter figure. The Force is said to have 371,000 personnel, which in itself is grossly inadequate for the protection of an estimated 250 million people.

In a House of Representatives plenary session, federal lawmakers denounced their inclusion as VIPs to be affected by the directive, and they expressed their resolve to meet with the president, for him to reconsider his position with regard to them. As of the time that the Inspector General gleefully declared that 11,566 police officers had been withdrawn from guard duties, Senator Ali Ndume revealed on a Channels Television programme that police officers attached to National Assembly members were still very much in service.

However, a few days later, Senator Abdul Ningi complained bitterly in plenary about the selective enforcement of the order, with his only security detail withdrawn. And, noticeable exemptions were, “The Senate President, Speaker of the House, ministers, governors, business concerns, even the sons and daughters of political office holders. I have seen singers (musicians), foreign business owners with police escorts,” Mr Ningi observed.

The dithering response to the directive was not lost on the president, who had to reiterate the instruction at the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting penultimate week. This is sad! It mirrors the failure of the Nigerian State to act in the public interest, more so at a time of an emergency. Yet, Mr Tinubu emphasised that police officers are trained to protect the lives and property of citizens, particularly the most vulnerable, and not overwhelmingly those of a privileged few. He added that the National Security and Civil Defence Corps “are trained for VIP protection and are around too.”

All eyes are now on Nuhu Ribadu, the National Security Adviser (NSA), whom the president directed to take the implementation of the renewed directive “very seriously.” Ministers are not exempt from the order, the president also pointed out. But if at any time their assignment warrants police protection, his clearance should be sought. It is now as stringent as that!

With command and control entrenched in police operations, it is therefore unimaginable that lowly ranked police officers deployed to guard VIPs would refuse to obey a presidential order to return to their professional beats. Each of these officers is from a Police Command, meaning that there is an immediate boss to whom they are answerable. As a result, the logic of the police “enforcement team” is rank deception. At play is the perverse safeguarding of the transactional underpinning of these elite security protection gigs. To avoid being noticed by the public, police officers, who are still engaged in this, reportedly now wear plain clothes or black suits.

Our overpaid lawmakers see themselves as a special breed of Nigerians, not to be affected by the order. Nevertheless, no life is more valuable than another. As a coterie of underperforming officials of the state, in both the making of legislation and oversight of national institutions, they contributed in no small measure to the country’s prevailing security mess. In October, the House of Representatives, for instance, discharged its eight Standing Committees of their work on Bills referred to them, which they had failed to deliver on since December 2024, in some cases, and after the 60-day timeframe stipulated by the House Rule in others.

ALSO READ: UPDATED: Senate requests Tinubu to exempt lawmakers from police withdrawal directive

Also in the Senate, the failure of the Committee on Finance to carry out oversight on 92 revenue-generating agencies forced Senate President Godwill Akpabio to threaten to sack non-performing committee chairpersons when Mr Ningi raised the issue last December. Some senators have not even moved a motion, let alone sponsored any bill, since their inauguration in the National Assembly.

Therefore, seeking the accretion of more privilege in maintaining their police guards, amid such dismal stewardship, besides the daily killings and kidnapping of citizens, is an indulgence unacceptable to Nigerians. A soldier was killed, and 13 travellers were abducted last Tuesday along the Okene-Auchi Highway. In the same manner, 12 worshippers at the ECWA church in Kogi State were kidnapped last week. These sordid narratives have become endless.

However, it is heartening that officers of the 24 Mobile Police Force Unit, attached to the presidential escort at the State House, Abuja, were reportedly withdrawn last Thursday for redeployment to different states. This is the most serious expression of the presidential order’s gravity and strong message to some disloyal police officers and members of the elite, determined to undermine public safety for selfish reasons.