The Governor of Ekiti State and the Chairman of the Nigerian Governors Forum, Kayode Fayemi, has advocated what he called a multi level policing structure in the country.
By multi level policing, Fayemi means the existence of the Federal Police, and institutionalized policing at the state and local government levels.
He said that the call for multi level policing which involves institutionalized police presence at all the tiers of government does not mean calling for the scrapping of the federal police.
Fayemi spoke at a two-day Multi-Dtakeholders Meeting on Peace and Inclusive Security Initiative organized by the Nigeria Governors’ Forum in partnership with the Center for Democracy & Development in Abuja on Thursday.
Fayemi dismissed the fears expressed in some quarters that dismantling the monolithic police structure could be abused at the state level.
The NGF Chairman argued that even the Federal police which he said is still not effective is being abused.
He urged Nigerians to focus on the institutional framework that would prevent abuse of such powers rather than using such an excuse to avoid doing the right thing.
He pointed out that there are mechanisms in the nation’s constitution that are deliberately designed to protect the rights of the citizens from abuse.
He said, “On local authorities who may not subscribe to institutionality or rules, this is a perennial excuse that we get. I’m not going to sit here and make an excuse that such powers in the hands of some local actors may not be abused.
“Federal police that we all know abuses the rights of citizens, including the rights of governors, even with immunity, you may not know that.
“I was abused by a federal police in 2014 during my election and I had immunity. Anybody could abuse. It could happen, even if you devolve security to the local level.
“However, what we need to be talking about is, what institutional frameworks should we put in place to ensure that such powers are not abused, not to use it as an excuse not to do the right thing.
“Because at the end of the day, there are mechanisms in our constitution to protect citizens rights.”
Fayemi stressed that there is always a regulatory authority that is empowered to sanction and punish those who abuse the system in most countries where you have multi-level policing.
He said that while abuse is inevitable, society should focus on such a regulatory body that couch be relied on to punish or sanction such cases of abuse or violations.
He explained that there are different kinds of crimes which fall under the purview of the federal, state and local government police which should he handled by the police at such a level.
Fayemi who also spoke on the use of security votes by state governors, said that the state governments funds all security institutions in the country.
He stressed that the state governments fund the police even more than the Federal Government by paying their allowances, procuring operational vehicles, and in some cases ammunition among others.
Fayemi who talked about the increasing involvement of the military in civil protection said that most Nigerians don’t trust the police and beg for military checkpoints in the areas
“You say what do we do with it? Without mincing words, I can’t speak for others. But I also get feedback from other states in my capacity as chairman of the governor’s forum. There is hardly any of these institutions we that you are talking about that we don’t fund. We fund the police.
“We fund the police more than the Federal Government, quote me. State governors fund police more than the Federal Government. We buy them vehicles. We pay them allowances.
“And if we are to engage our military in aid to civil authority, which you will find, actually in 36 states in this country today, the military is involved in internal security operations, which really is a problem because for me, it’s a role inflation.
“Now, when you inflate the role of the security institution, beyond its primary responsibility, you also have consequences that will come with that. That may not be palatable. But that’s where we are, because most Nigerians don’t trust police.
“They will still come and beg governor, Governor, please, can you ask the brigade commander to put a roadblock in my area. And this, right from the bottom up you are talking about, ordinary citizens insist that we should put… and you can’t put military roadblocks everywhere. It’s not possible how many do we even have.
But if you engage the military, in a civil authority, your state is only responsible to pay for the rations of the men that is engaged in that activity and not expect to have the military also share that burden because that’s not their primary responsibility.
You’ve taken them out of their primary responsibility, you have to pay for it. So we pay for that, we pay for Civil Defence, There is no security institution that you have that states are not responsible for more than the Federal Government that has primary responsibility for them.” He added