Civil rights advocacy group, Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has warned against the continuous toleration of crass incompetence and the general collapse of professionalism and discipline in the Nigeria Police Force.

It also charged President Muhammadu Buhari to scout for a tested, trusted, competent and professionally meritorious patriotic Nigerian Police Officer to step in as the next Inspector General of Police with the imminent retirement of IGP Mohammed Adamu on February 1, 2021.

The rights group said whereas it has no objection to the extension of tenures of service chiefs of the core armed forces like the Army, Navy and Air Force, the Police Force stands out distinctively different from these core armed forces segments because of its inability to curb internal security breaches hence the reason for the armed forces such as the Nigerian Army is overstretched and overburdened with internal security operations that ordinarily the Nigeria Police Force ought to statutorily be in charge of.

“Therefore, let nobody compare the extension of services granted to the Armed forces heads leading the counter terror measures in the theatres of counter terrorism to be same as that of the office of the IGP whose manifest failures have compelled the army to take up statutory policing duties and routines to stop criminals from destroying and over-running Nigeria,” HURIWA said.

The rights group said the speculation that the current IGP Adamu is strenuously lobbying to obtain the undeserved and indeed illegal extension of his tenure of office beyond what the statute has provided for, is disturbing going by the urgency of the need for the Nigerian Police Force to be fundamentally restructured, reorganised, reformed and the rejigged to be in the position to play her law enforcement and crime prevention strategic roles according to the global best practices and in compliance with the principle of the Rule of law.

HURIWA said Nigeria needs a Police Chief who will introduce technologies for crime prevention and bolster the intelligence gathering capacities of the operatives and officers of the Nigeria Police Force.

HURIWA said it is by this statement demanding “that Mr. President should make good his January 1st solemn promise to reshape and reorganise the security strategies of this administration given that all around the entire North East and North West, terrorists, armed Fulani herdsmen, kidnappers and bandits have turned the hitherto peaceful regions into killing and crime fields just as there is a clear failure of the leadership of the Nigerian Police Force and the hierarchies of the various internal security architectures such as the Nigerian Customs Service, the Nigerian Immigration Services and the National Defence Corp.

“Now that vacancies exists in all of these strategic offices, it is our expectations that President Buhari will use this as the clearest opportunity to scout for the best minds and the most competent and qualified persons to be appointed heads of these internal security operations. Mr. President is known to practice nepotism and always picking persons even with the least qualifications provided that they are from his ethnicity and/or religion. This pattern has gone on since 2015.

“This is the exact reason that terrorism, and all kinds of blood cuddling violence have become the norm rather than the exception in all parts of the Country and especially in the North of Nigeria which is where all the current heads of the internal security architectures hail from. But for the Nigerian Army, Air Force and Navy, the entire country would have collapsed.

“HURIWA joins the rest of the community of patriotic citizens of Nigeria to ask President Buhari to behave like a statesman and stop his nepotistic practices of always insisting on persons of his religion and ethnicity holding these aforementioned internal security positions and incidentally, there are now vacancies at the top most echelons of Police, Customs, Immigration, Civil Defence and Prisons.

“As the IGP Adamu reaches the mandatory limit of 35 years in service on February 1, 2021, we reject any attempt by President Buhari to capitulate and cave in to the intense pressure and lobbying by the failed IGP who is also eager to get an extension.”

Besides, the rights group said the Police Act signed by President Buhari last year, provides tenure system for the position and reiterated retirement terms as 60 years of age or 35 years of service just as the rights advocacy group has insisted that the powers of the President does not include the willful breach of extant laws for that will violate Section 15(5) of the Nigerian Constitution which provides that it is the obligation of the Nigerian State to abolish all corrupt practices and abuse of power.

It said: “President Buhari must comply by the law that even he himself signed and let this failed Inspector General of Police go home. The President must not accede to the thinking and the naked ambitions of Adamu Mohammed who is reportedly banking on extension of his tenure as the country’s top cop in what insiders dub “the Service Chiefs treatment.”

HURIWA recalled that the heads of the Nigerian Correctional Service (NCoS), Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NCDC), the Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS) have had their tenures extended by between 6 and 18 months. The Comptroller-General of the NCoS, Jaafaru Ahmed, was due to retire on July 21, 2019, but got a one-year presidential extension to July 2020. This was again extended by another six months, at the instance of the Minister of Interior, Rauf Argebesola.

HURIWA lamented that the tenure of NSCDC’s Abdullahi Muhammadu Gana, which expired in July 2020, was extended through presidential approval by six months. The extension lapses this month. Immigration chief, Mohammed Babandede’s tenure, which was extended in mid-2020 by six months, has again lapsed. No appointment has been made to replace any of the senior security officials.

HURIWA reminded President Buhari that the new Police Act signed by him in September last year provides for a tenure of four years for the Inspector-General of Police.

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