As the nation awaits the outcome of proposed police reform, former Assistant Inspector General of Police, Chief Tunji Alapini, speaking with KAMAL TAYO OROPO on Friday, declared that the nation should rest the idea of a state police for now, even as he declared that the Ministry of Police Affairs is an unnecessary level of authority merely duplicating efforts.Do you support calls for the decentralization of the police'In what sense are we even talking about police reform' The government set up a committee on police reform and they have just submitted a report. We don't know what is their submission, we don't know if the government is going to accept their recommendations and as such one cannot say much on what is going on regarding the reform and its possible outcome.In a recent discussion with one of my friends, a serving governor, this debate on state police came up. I said to him, there have been pros and cons of the desirability of the state police over the years. And that we have noticed that the states have been funding and providing logistic support for the Nigerian Police Force. I don't know what the police is doing in terms of providing logistics for its operations. However, based on the assistance of these governors, they now feel that, 'he who pays the piper should dictate the tune'.I told my friend that the present arrangement is healthier the way it is. But he told me that the governors cannot be paying so much money and would not be able to control the force.The problem the country will have when we have state police is that all the resources in the state will be pumped into establishing a virile and efficient police force. What's more, the citizens in the state would now start giving him problems. I told him that, by the time you start this state police, there would be competition involving the states.Besides the inherent dangers state police poses, which are the matter of controlling the force by the incumbent governor, the challenges are enormous. Some may argue that the government at the center exercises similar control over the force, by dictating to the organisation, but these are two different cases. The system of controlling the police at the federal level is significantly different.If we are unfortunate to have a contest, regarding boundary delineation or other challenges, between two governors from two rival political parties, tackling it may not be that very easy. One does not have to over-stress what may happen in the course of the governors trying to establish authority and power. They are likely to use the only power in their possession to secure their territory; and that's the police under their direct command.With state police, you are telling me you want to put the police in State A at loggerheads with the police in State B; that is the way it appears to me. In addition, the way the present governors go about in their convoys, by the time you have state police, you will start seeing armoured tanks following them. Under the guise of securing their states, they would start buying armoured tanks and by the time they are through, they would have no money to run their states.There are countries where state police is operated. Are you saying that Nigeria is not matured to run state police'Answering your question frankly, we are not mature at all to run a state police; even if it's being done elsewhere. This is Nigeria; not United States, and you must remember we have our peculiar situation ' it's a fact of life. However, we are mature enough to have a decentralised police based on the geo-political zonal command arrangement.There was a time the authorities wanted to have the DIGs (Deputy Inspector General) or AIGs (Assistant Inspector General) to be in charge of the geo-political zones; there would be a DIG in charge of the South-west, Northwest or North-central and so on, with the Inspector General (IG) supervising all and the zones having a say in how they are policed. Each zonal command would have its budget, as their needs may differ. It is only when something is beyond that zone or something in the nature of cross-zonal interest, which you now have the federal police coming in.But if we make the mistake of having 36 autonomous police forces within the federation, we may push the country into serious trouble in terms of personnel and financing. With autonomous state police, each state will ask for two things: their indigenes in the present day police force to be withdrawn to their state of origin. But if that is not acceptable, then it means each state would now have to recruit and train its police force.Sometime ago, we mulled this idea of sending certain categories of officers to their states of origin. I don't know what prompted the jettisoning of that idea. I believe it would have been the best option in terms of policing the country, especially considering local challenges and community policing.You'll find that in most of these areas, it is the indigenes, who are able to understand the terrain and gain the confidence of the local people. I don't have to leave here, Lagos, to go and serve in Niger State, for example. If I go to serve in Niger State, first of all, I will have to get to know the terrain. I will have to know the people, the culture and their behavioral pattern before I can fully integrate.There is proposal that an officer should not serve more than two years in a given command. What is your take on this'Two years is too short for anyone to fully grasp the demands of the state. Definitely, an officer would find it hard to get a grip within two years. However, if you have someone who is from Niger State, who grew up in Minna and probably schooled there, you do not have to tell him where this road leads to and where that road leads, he's most likely to know his way around without the aid of a map.Is this not one of the reasons the Ministry of Police Affairs was established' How do you feel about the committee's recommendation that the ministry be scrapped'As far as I am concerned, I don't see why we should have all these unnecessary duplications of command authorities. We have the Police Service Commission, the Inspector General and the Ministry of Police Affairs. What do we need all these for' What is the Ministry going to do that the PSC and the IG office cannot do' There was a time in the history of this country we had a Ministry of Police Affairs (the ministry is not new), and it was scrapped. Then we had the Department of Police Affairs, this too was later scrapped. It was brought back two more times and scrapped before it came to stay finally. What informed all these policy summersaults, the scrapping and bringing back'If they have had to scrap it once, something must have prompted that. And if they have decided to bring it back, what is the purpose.I see it as duplication of effort. When it comes to operations, you can minimize the activities of so many supervising authorities on an organisation. I believe the Police Service Commission and the office of the Inspector General are enough to run the force. The Service Commission is there to discipline and promote and the Inspector General office is there for operations. Whatever they require for their operations they can easily get it together and perform their duties.The Police Pension scheme is one of the vexed issues. As a pensioner, how satisfied are you with the scheme'I retired into the regime of the new pension administrators; people working out what our entitlements are; and they give us half of these entitlements and the other is paid as gratuities every month. But there is a flaw. I retired, after serving for 35 years, but they removed six months from my years of service, when they were paying my pension. And I had to remind them that I joined the force June 15, 1974 and retired June 15, 2009. But when they were calculating my years, they worked out the years from June 15, 1974 to June 31, 2004.They started calculating again from January 2005 till I retired in June 2009. And I now asked them, 'What happened to my entitlement between July and December 2004''They have not replied me, but co-incidentally today (Friday, August 17, 2012) they replied me that there was no contribution from the police during that period, which means six months were removed from my service years. Where is the six months' money' This is part of the problems we are having in the Nigerian Police Force today. I have written to my pension administrators and they have in turn written to Pension Commission (PENCOM). But PENCOM replied them that it was the Police who did not pay the six months. They said it did not affect only me, but many others.Now, if we have thousands of police officers who have retired, and you deduct six months entitlements from each and every one of them, where is this huge sum of money' My pension administrator said I should go and meet the police, but I told them to go and ask the police by themselves; I am not going to be wasting my meagre amount chasing police authorities.Besides, the police authorities are hearing me; they should do something about the issues. I have served this country for 35 years and I think I deserve better. So, I look at my situation and if that is the way I feel, I am sure many others will feel same way.Does your experience not justify people's concern about corruption in the force'Well, you may say the Police is corrupt, but the police is very redeemable. The way the Inspector General, Mohammed Abubakar, is going at the moment is commendable. He is an officer I have known for years. The most important thing he has done recently is the scrapping of police roadblocks. This action has been able to bring a lot of respect to the force.Now, all he has to do, regardless of the corrupt nature of a segment of the police force, is to sit on his officers; the organisation is still redeemable. But all officers would have to live up to expectation; the AIGs, the commissioners of police, the Area Commanders, the DPOs and the station officers have responsibilities. Anyone that is found wanting in his areas of responsibilities should be made to account for his actions.I am a security consultant and I have had cause to consult for some people. What I get as feed-back from my clients is such that at times I feel ashamed being a member of the Nigerian Police Force. But I cannot obliterate the fact that I served the police for 35 years. So whether for bad or good, I am part of this system.For example, my client had a problem and he wrote to the Commissioner of Police about it. Before the commissioner could response to his petition, a copy was already with the other side. And there is no way a copy could have gotten to the other side except through the office of the Commissioner of Police. I said to him not to worry that we would go further than that. We will go to court and file a case in respect of the observation. Again, between the time we filed the court process and the process with the police, the other side was already with a copy of our petition and complaint. I said to him don't lose hope; we will continue.Those are the issues of corruption within the police. Somebody said this is the aftermath of the ban on roadblocks. I said no! I said those individuals have tendencies for corruption. The IG has done the right thing and it's yielding dividends. People can travel from here to Benin if the road is not bad and get there within two or three hours. In times past, between Lagos and Benin, you might encounter about 50 roadblocks; between here and Ibadan, you might encounter 10-20 roadblocks but it's now smooth sail. Motorised patrol is the most important. And it must be ensured that there is adequate provision for the fueling and maintenance of the vehicles.On salary, what would you suggest as starting point for the police'It's not the amount that matters. You can be earning N10,000 and be contented. You can be earning N20,000 too and be contented. They can be paying N100, 000 and they will still feel disgruntled.In the first place, a policeman should be able to have somewhere to stay; a policeman should be able to move within his residenceand office with ease and there must be that job satisfaction. In those good old days, we used to have recreation rooms both at the police stations and the barracks. They should have somewhere to hangout within the office and feel relaxed. They should be treated like human beings. At the end of the day, everyone will be happy to go to the office. Then, we had a hall where we normally watch TV. If there was football match, we always watched; it was only when there were emergencies that they called us.To what extent have the police been able to discharge its primary duty of internal security looking at the state of the nation'I won't say the police have failed. I think what might have been responsible for what's termed 'police failure' is the issue of not 'nipping it in the bud' because when the issue started, we advised on community policing (I and some people). Why don't we employ community policing by ensuring that up to ward level in each state, people move closer to the police to able to tell you if a stranger or vehicle is around. When you start at that level, you will be able to nip it in the board before it escalates. But they told us they were on top of the situation only to discover now that the situation is on top of them.If they had taken that clue, they would have been able to succeed. I have called one or two officers and pointed out something.There's another trend now that they are not nipping in the bud. People are now driving vehicles without numbers. Those with numbers, they cover it with black leather like official vehicle of the Governor. Initially, it used to be one or two but now they are everywhere. It is very dangerous notwithstanding that it is against traffic regulations that before you are on the highway, you must have vehicle registration number. I don't know what they are doing about it. You see people who are not entitled to policesecurity going to social parties with police escorts. If all these plate numbers being covered commit havoc, how do you identify the vehicles' They drive past traffic points where the light is red. There is nothing stopping officers on duty from accosting such covered vehicles. If you don't have anything negative, why are you covering it'Do you think the police is equipped to be on top of these internal issues without necessarily calling in the military'Well, I won't know if they are really well equipped. I left the service about four years ago and so I don't know their operational capabilities. From what we are seeing, I will only say they are making efforts because we read in the papers that they succeeded in arresting this and that and it is based on that that we can say they are doing well or not.When we were in the service, we made our needs known to the organisation and they provided what they could. It may not be 100 per cent.Do you think political leaders are directing the affairs of the state properly'Like I said sometime ago when I attended a seminar, the first way to start cutting our politicians to size is to stop addressing members of the House of Representatives as 'Honourables' until they prove to us that they are. We should stop calling Senators 'Distinguished' until they distinguish themselves before us.Do you think the nation will still remain a united entity'We will remain as one. We can continue to clamour or shout that we should divide or go different ways, but we cannot sustain it. We cannot do that. I went to school with people from different parts of this country. They are part of my life, so I have to get a visa to see them if you say we should go our different ways. The reason people clamour for this is because things are not right and it's another way of telling us to make things right.What is the right thing'I am not a politician but I am saying they should do the right things. A far as I am concerned, we were going for Olympics and we didn't prepare, but we expect to bring home medals. Whatever we want to do, we should prepare and that's the way I look at it.
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