State Police: Omo Oduduwa Collective hails FG’s commitment, fears presidential control

The Omo Oduduwa Collective, a socio-political group, has commended the resolve of the Federal Government to expedite action in considering the clamour for state police, saying it was heartwarming that the issue of state police has moved from rhetoric and advocacy podiums to the floor of the National Assembly.

The group, in a statement on Monday, noted that after decades of advocacy, the proposed bill to establish state police has been passed by the National Assembly, saying this represented “the most serious attempt to restructure Nigeria’s security architecture in the face of increasing normalisation of horror and the ravages of sanguinary realities within the country.”

In the statement signed by Professor Akinyemi Onigbinde (Convener); Kazeem Olasupo (Secretary) and Dr Adeolu Oyekan (Group Admin), the Omo Oduduwa Collective noted that “Nigeria runs a federal constitution with unitary police,” saying “that contradiction is at the heart of our security failure.”

It added that “the Nigeria Police Force is overstretched, with a ratio of about one officer to 600 citizens, far below the UN standard of 1:450,” and said, “in a proper federation, proximity matters in the administration of security, as crime is local and environmentally determined.”

The group said: “For instance, kidnapping in Katsina, cult clashes in Rivers, and urban crime in Lagos require different responses rooted in local knowledge.

“Today, governors are called chief security officers but have no command over the police in their states, and neither can the state chief executive give operational instructions to a Divisional Police Officer (DPO) in charge of a Local Government Area of a state under his jurisdiction.

“Centralised policing is an outlier when it comes to the working hypothesis of federalism as instantiated in the models of the US, Canada, Germany, India, and Brazil. Suffice to say that there are ample planks upon which state police can be deemed one of the necessary steps required for consummating Nigeria’s federalism. And not necessarily a favour to the states.”

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While commending the move to make state police realisable, Omo Oduduwa Collective, however, said, “Commendation must not blind us to defects. A law that is meant to deepen federalism must not, in the same breath, entrench new forms of central control. And a law that creates new institutions must not ignore the rot in the old ones.

“As currently drafted, the bill holds great promise, but also carries provisions that threaten to undermine the federal principle it seeks to advance. The greatest flaw in the current Bill is the provision of section 214 (10) that allows the President and the Inspector General of Police to take over when seemingly justifying circumstances arise.

“On the surface, these circumstances are presented as a well-intended legal buffer against potential abuse by governors. Yet, leveraging them can inevitably spin off corollaries that undermine the fabric of our federalism. “For instance, the circumstantial contexts of national security threats, systematic human rights abuse, electoral intimidation, and ethnic persecution, seemingly justifiable premises for deeming federal takeover an expediency, can be read subjectively, as they are essentially not defined with strict, judicially reviewable thresholds.”

It cautioned that “consequently, a legal lacuna is presented for presidents with anti-federalist persuasions to abuse that section of the law by overriding state police, citing exaggerated premises, during elections, protests, or political disagreements.”

According to the group, the earlier State Police Bill drafted by the Governors’ Forum, circa 2022, did not contain this presidential takeover clause, saying “it only rightfully recognised presidential takeover in well-defined circumstances such as a complete breakdown of law and order, a direct request for assistance by the governor, or where the State Police had become non-functional.”

The state authorities, it observed, have the opportunity to right this wrong, as the bill is being extended to the state houses of assembly for debate. “The retention of such a clause would suggest that the Bill is now being shaped less by the genuine quest for autonomy and more by the need to consolidate their conformist disposition to the mandate of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.”

It said the bill “is completely silent on election security” and noted that “this omission is a recipe for a constitutional crisis. Elections in Nigeria are already volatile. Other federations like India solve it by placing election security under their equivalent of the Independent Electoral Commission, with both federal and state forces operating under the electoral authority’s command during elections. Our Bill must take a cue or adopt a more suitable model.”