The Police: Friends, foes or something in between...

Written by Duncan Thursday, 05 May 2011

Over the years, many Nigerians have come to distrust the popular PR message of the Nigeria Police 'The Police is your friend'. Daily Trust Online spoke with some Nigerians to find out what experiences they may have had with the Police that has contributed to their individual views about the men of the service.

Disgust and fear are two of the most common responses one gets from most Nigerians when responding to any query about the Nigerian police.

The feeling of disdain towards the police in Nigeria has led to the new cliché “my police story”. Everybody is expected to have an uncanny police story, mostly negative because it is now rare to hear good tales of Nigeria’s finest officers in black.

Apart from the usual sleight of hand trick often witnessed between motorists and Police men at check points all over country - an aberration that is now an acceptable norm - on high ways in most part of Nigeria, the Nigerian Police are challenged in meeting the international standard of one police man to four citizen ratio.

Most often, the disaffection most Nigerians harbour towards the Police is reflective of a lack of confidence in the force to 'Protect and Serve with Integrity.'

This Daily Trust reporter hit the streets of Abuja to investigate the reasons behind the often heard ill-feelings towards the police, asking citizens to share their “Police Story”.

Mohammed Ali. a civil servant in Abuja, in a jolly mood narrated the story of his police arrest for being in a 'Black spot'. He said; “I had never heard of the term 'black spot' before. I only stopped to pick up a female friend at a junction close to her house when the police forced us to follow them to the station. This was only about 7 pm in the evening”.

AlKasim Abdulkadir described his Police story with some amusement, looking back at the unfortunate event when he was arrested for "BGT".

He recalled that he had astonishingly asked the police men who accosted him that how can he be said to “belong to a gang of thieves” when he was alone on a busy road in Minna, looking to get a taxi home, when the police arrested him.

Madam Janet a trader in Utako, Abuja, said she was arrested for vouching for the innocence of a neighbor who a Police man came to her compound to arrest. In the fracas that ensued, she admitted to hitting the officer with a stick which resulted in an injury. In her words “the police man tried to push me down the stairs so I grabbed his shirt and in the process tore his shirt and hit him with my walking stick”.

Janet  claimed the Police detained her at their post from around 11 am in the morning until 8 pm demanding she pay 15, 000 naira as 'settlement'. 

Mike Ehuma a resident of Karmo, a suburb of Abuja, complained that the Police arrested about seven of his friends at a society club meeting in Karmo. According to Mike, “they said we were planning a coup, that our gathering was illegal. In the end they demanded two thousand naira from us”. 

Simon, a business man and taxi driver in Utako, said the fear of police is the beginning of wisdom in Nigeria, he narrated his tale of woes when the Police arrested him at Jabi junction for allegedly flouting traffic rules.

However, it was not all stories of woes against the police, Mr. Christian an Abuja based civil servant, believes that the police if properly funded can do better; he blamed the ineffectiveness of the Nigerian Police on a corrupt system, urging the appropriate authorities to rebrand the police force.

Whatever the case may be, the security situation in the country in recent times have raised serious questions about the effectiveness of the Police to curb crime and dispense justice effectively. And with the common practise of serving as Judge, Jury and Executioner in many cases, it is no wonder that some Nigerians find it hard to understand how they can be called their 'friends'.

Comments (0)

Show/hide comments

Show/hide comment form