Written by Jideofor Adibe.
The proposal for a state police appears
to have become mired in politics. And like most issues in the country
in which the emotionally-charged identities of region and religion are
brought in to interface in the discourse, opinions and positions appear
to increasingly converge with the politics of North-South divide. Of
course it is sometimes difficult to know when the purveyors of the
various perspectives really mean what they say and when they are merely
grandstanding or perhaps trying to use their publicly stated positions
as bargaining chips in the authoritative allocation of values in other
areas of our national political economy. The danger of dragging the
emotive issue of primordial identity into what should be a rational
political discourse, however, is that while our favourite past time as
Nigerians is to bemoan why things don’t work in our country, we will
often be happy to vote for things not to work if what is necessary to
make those things work will be perceived as disadvantaging or
humiliating ‘our people’, even if temporarily.
One, state police, which are a type of
sub-national territorial police force, operate widely across the world
in both federal and non-federal states. Where they are found, they are
usually responsible for most normal police duties, including the
maintenance of public order, criminal detection and highway patrol.
Countries with territorial police include USA, UK, Australia, Canada,
India, Japan and Switzerland. Contrary to popular belief, having state
police does not preclude having national police forces. For instance, in
the United Kingdom where you have territorial police, including special
police for some towns such as the Metropolitan Police for the Greater
London Area, you also have national police with specific, non-regional
jurisdiction such as the British Transport Police who are responsible
for policing the railways and light rail systems. Similarly, in the USA
with its multiplicity of state and county police forces, there are
various specialized agencies that enforce national laws such as the FBI,
the Department of Justice (DOJ), the Drug Enforcement Administration
and the United States Coast Guards.
In Nigeria, sections 214 and 215 of the
1999 Constitution (as amended) provide that the Nigerian Police shall be
under the full and exclusive control of the federal government and that
the authority and powers of the force extends over the entire country.
At the apex of the Nigeria Police Force is the Inspector General of
Police who is vested with the command of the entire Police Force. Each
state of the federation has a commissioner of police who is the
commander of the contingent of police stationed in the state but
answerable to the IGP.
Two, proponents of state police argue
that given the pervasive insecurity in the country, it is important to
have state police so the state governors can effectively be in charge of
security in their domain. They see as anomalous the idea that a
governor who is constitutionally designated as the chief security
officer of his state is neither in control of the police forces
stationed in his state nor is he allowed to establish one. It is also
argued that policing is essentially a local service and that since most
crimes are local in nature, a state police force may be needed because
crime detection will often require local knowledge and methods that such
a state police force can better provide. Proponents of state police
equally argue that the Nigerian police, as constituted, are grossly
underfunded and ill-trained and that many state governments are already
helping in the provision of logistics to the police forces stationed in
their state.
Three, the opponents of state police
have their own arguments: For instance, they argue that a state police
force will be abused by the state governors as happened under the First
Republic. They call attention to several instances of state abuse of
state agencies such as the State Independent Electoral Commissions
(SIECs) which have not been able to conduct elections to local
governments in most states since their creation because the governors do
not want such elections. Attention is also drawn to the emasculation of
state legislatures and the virtual pocketing of state High Courts by
these governors. It is equally argued that the establishment of state
police will empower secessionist tendencies as it will make it easier to
militarize the various ethnic militias. Opponents of state police also
argue that state police will impose a strangulating financial burden on
the states, most of which are already on the brink of bankruptcy. For
most of the opponents of state police, therefore, it will be better to
strengthen the existing police force by embarking on reforms, including
those that will help it to meet the UN recommended target of at least
220 police officers per 100,000 citizens.
Four, while I share some of the concerns
of the opponents of state police, I feel strongly that given the
enormous crisis in our nation building project and the near consensus
that ‘true federalism’ is the answer, the notion of state police readily
recommends itself. I completely reject as self-fulfilling prophecy the
argument that we are not ‘ripe’ for state police. What are we then
exactly ripe for, one may ask?
While I am in full support of state and
even local government and special police forces at the states, I equally
share the concerns about the possible misuse of such police by state
governors who are more or less Machiavellian Octopuses in their
enclaves. Just as I believe there is a need to reduce the powers of the
federal government, there is equally a need to drastically reduce the
powers of state governors and local government chairmen by introducing
effective safeguards and checks and balances. I believe that
restructuring the country should precede the introduction of state
police. The country first needs to agree on the appropriate number of
states for the country, the units that will partake in revenue sharing
from the federation account and the system of sharing revenue among the
different tiers of government. A state police without the necessary
structural reforms will only compound the problems.
Five, it is difficult to fathom out the
real reasons why the Northern Governors are opposing the idea of state
police. Their formal argument that such could lead to the break-up of
the country unfortunately plays into the hands of those who unfairly
accuse the region of being parasitic. In any marriage, it is often wrong
for one partner to give the impression that he or she is unduly scared
of the marriage imploding up because the impression will then be created
that the partner is an undue beneficiary from the union. Both partners
must desire the marriage for it to work and no one should be allowed to
use it as a tool of blackmail. In the unlikely event that Nigeria breaks
up, there is no way of knowing which area will fare better or worse as
necessity is often the mother of invention. In fact, if we use the
current internally generated revenue as a measure of which area will
survive in the unlikely event of a break-up, then only Lagos and Sokoto
States will. According to the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS),
Lagos had the highest IGR in 2008/2009 of 60 per cent followed by Sokoto
State which had an IGR of 46 per cent. Besides, why should a region
which undoubtedly is the food basket of the country continue to give the
impression that it is dead-scared of the country imploding? And this is
coming after the same forum not long ago called the bluff of champions
of the Sovereign National Conference – part of the political cat and
mouse games played by the various regional and ethnic factions of the
elite – by suddenly supporting the idea? I feel that those who purport
to speak for the North sometimes take positions that play into the hands
of their political adversaries.
My personal opinion is that in the
unlikely event of the break-up of the country, one of the most
vulnerable parts of the country will be the Niger Delta. This is because
in the resource curse theory and practice in Africa, countries endowed
with abundant natural resources have a higher tendency for instability
and even wars as we see in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and as
happened in Liberia.
Six, it is always good to ‘jaw-jaw’ and
Nigerians debating passionately about state police enrich our
marketplace of political ideas which is a key infrastructure of any
democracy. In the marketplace of ideas notion of democracy, ideas
compete vigorously for acceptance. In this sense, Rep Gerald Irona, who
is the Vice Chairman of the House of Representatives Committee on Gas,
got it all wrong when he declared that “people canvassing for state
police had evil agenda and do not want the corporate existence of
Nigeria.” (BusinessDay July 29 2012). You cannot use blackmail to
suppress ideas you do not like in the marketplace of ideas because the
only acceptable currency is the power of the thoughts and the logic
behind them. Resort to blackmail is often an indication that either one
has no ideas to market or that the power and logic behind his ideas are
not strong enough to compete.
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