If you thought nothing good could ever come out of the police barracks, you may just be wrong!
Nigeria’s police chief, Dr Kayode Egbetokun, recently hugged media attention for the right reasons when he showcased the brightest and best of the organisation at the second edition of the Nigeria Police Awards and Commendations ceremony in Abuja.
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For a change, the police had good stories — of valour, competence, dedication, integrity and much more — to tell, showing that in spite of the bad headlines which the force had attracted in the past, it still has many good eggs in its basket.
Police Awards
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The event featured awards in various categories: Crime Buster of the Year; Community Policing Advocate of the Year; Detective of the Year; Police Sports Person of the Year; DPO of the Year; Area Commander of the Year; Patrol Team of the Year; and Traffic Officer of the Year. There were also awards for Gallantry and Integrity and Police Officer of the Year. The IGP Special Recognition Awards were also given to officers who distinguished themselves in professional fields such as Public Relations, Legal Practice, and Medical Services.
For once, the police smelt of roses. But beneath the glitz and the backslapping among ‘long-time-no-see’ old geezers, and the impeccable ceremonial dressing of the younger elements, there was the undercurrent of the theatricality of it all. Was the show just being put up to satisfy the public yearning for a police service with a human face rather than a police force that wasn’t sure whether it was an army of occupation or a bunch of strong-arm fixers?
IGP Egbetokun deserves his flowers for motivating his men with the award scheme. Perceptive analysts are, however, quick to warn the police not to be carried away by the sound of its own panegyrics. Critics and commentators recall one of the lowest points in the history of policing in Nigeria — the ENDSARS protest, and warn that the types of complaints that culminated in that protest have been rearing their heads again.
Bad Eggs
The other day, when a policeman shot and killed a 14-year-old student at a checkpoint in Ibadan, allegedly because the boy’s father who was driving refused to stop as ordered, the verdict of the motoring public was not focussed on the driver who refused to stop. It was on whether the punishment for refusing to stop at a police checkpoint is death.
The trigger-happy policeman, confronted by an irate crowd, ran for cover at the nearby Ladoke Akintola Airport. A huge crowd of protesters carried the boy’s corpse and deposited it in the governor’s office at the Oyo State Secretariat, Agodi, Ibadan, demanding justice.
The authorities moved swiftly to douse the tension caused by that incident which could easily have ballooned to a city-wide riot. But let nobody think that the people will take their eyes off the ball. They will wait to see how the whole issue will be handled before ‘incidenting’ it among their ‘actionable’ grievances.
Around the same time, one Inspector Obi Modestus was shown in a viral video assaulting an Uber driver in Lagos. The video, shared on social media platform X by user @dammiedammie35 (Oyindamola), drew widespread condemnation from the public. Despite passengers’ pleas for him to stop, the officer dragged the driver into a police vehicle and later returned to demand the deletion of the video.
The Complaint Response Unit (CRU) of the Lagos State Police Command has reportedly summoned Inspector Modestus. The Police Public Relations Officer, CSP Benjamin Hundeyin, warned that, “The Lagos State Police Command, under the leadership of Commissioner of Police CP Olohundare Jimoh, will not condone any form of incivility to members of the public”. Nigerians are watching!
Generally, Nigerians hold senior police officers in high esteem because the higher echelon of the force are more polished than the lower ranks. People often wonder if civility is not one of the subjects in the training modules of the police colleges that produce the rank and file who interact with the public everyday.
In these days of banditry, kidnapping and sundry acts of terror, you would think that the police would realise that their best allies are the young people in the society. But it seems the reverse is the case as the police seem to think that young people have access to easy money which they can be forced to share at gunpoint.
When I watched the video of some policemen of the Ogwashi-Uku division assaulting the President of the Student Union Government (SUG) of the Delta State Polytechnic, Ogwashi-Uku, I told myself that the matter ought to be escalated to the superior officers at the police high command in order to stem the madness.
In the video, the President of the Student Union alleged that the officers slapped him and threatened to shoot him unless he parted with a N500 bribe. They eventually shot at his vehicle. The SUG President shouted in rage: “You slapped me because I refused to settle you. You will see what you have never seen in your life before… Ogwashi-Uku divisional police slapped me, SUG president, because I refused to settle them N500!”
The officers didn’t bargain for a brazen fight back. They jumped into their operational vehicle. The student ran after them as they drove off. He screamed, “Look at you, criminals! The whole world is going to see you!” One policeman stepped out of the vehicle and fired a shot in the air.
The police made a quick getaway. The student leader and his colleagues licked their wounds. End of story for the day. But a psychological wound had been inflicted on the young people which would make them so susceptible to anti-police protests in future. And all because of some miserable N500!
Good Eggs
In the midst of all the stories of woe, there are accounts of policemen who have behaved like guardian angels to members of the public. I have personally been assisted by a police patrol team to change a flat tyre of my brand new VW Passat at night on the Shagamu-Benin expressway in the dangerous 80s when armed robbery kingpins, Lawrence Anini and Monday Osunbor, reigned supreme. There are still many good policemen out there, but the bad eggs and empty barrels are naturally louder.
The police high command may wish to review a 2012 study done on the subject, “Do the Nigerian public trust their police?” by Etannibi Alemika, Nic Cheeseman and Adrienne LeBas.
The Key findings of that study reveal that:
- Nearly one-half (48.5 per cent) of the respondents felt somewhat or very unsafe in meeting the police.
- Only 6.3 per cent of the respondents felt that the police were effective most of the time in preventing or containing violent conflicts.
- Only 6.4 per cent of those interviewed expressed a lot of trust in the police. An additional 16.7 per cent said they somewhat trust the police.
IGP Egbetokun may wish to update that study. The commendable institution of an annual award scheme to reward outstanding policemen should go hand in hand with a deliberate, research-based study to help build more trust between the police and the public. Without trust, all police exertions will be in vain.
Wole Olaoye is a Public Relations consultant and veteran journalist. He can be reached on [email protected], Twitter: @wole_olaoye; Instagram: woleola2021
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