The police is your friend. Nigerians have heard this expression over and over again to such an extent that they now take any expression of this catchy phrase not just with a pinch of salt, but with more than a seed of suspicion.
Many Nigerians who have had close encounters with the police have been left with sour aftertastes. Indeed, when towards the end of 2020, unprecedented protests convulsed the country, the police was firmly in the eye of the storm. The protest which quickly became about deep running disaffection about the state of the country was originally about a police unit ostensibly set up to fight the twin menaces of armed robbery and kidnapping but which had instead acquired a notoriety for extortion, torture and even murder, especially of young Nigerians.
The protests succeeded in taking down the much maligned police unit but that not before the police joined other state actors to massacre about eleven protesters at the Lekki Toll Gate in Lagos State.
Since then, the topsy-turvy relationship between Nigerians and the Nigerian Police Force has continued, haunted by the memories of indiscriminate killings of innocent Nigerians on the road over as little as twenty naira.
However, beyond the many avoidable atrocities committed by the rotten eggs which fill the basket of the Nigerian Police Force, a searing scrutiny of the force would reveal honest men and women who only want to serve Nigerians by maintaining law and order, preventing crime, and apprehending criminals.
A painstaking examination of the Nigerian Police Force would show a collection of men who put selflessness and professionalism above all else, but have been forced to work under debilitating dysfunction: dysfunction in funding, in conditions of work, in operations, dysfunction in everything.
Recently, there were reports of an impending strike by personnel of the Nigerian Police. According to recent online and social media reports, there were plans by policemen to embark on a two-week warning strike fixed for March 26.
According to the reports which have long been denied by the authorities of the Nigerian Police Force, the warning strike was to protest against poor working conditions, poor salaries, lack of genuine welfare benefits and outdated weapons.
According to reports, disgruntled police officers said the strike action was to protest the continued killings of police men by armed robbers without adequate compensation for their families. They also accused the federal government of lying about the increment of police salary and other promised benefits.
The disgruntled police officers were said to have demanded improved conditions of service, particularly salary increase and provision of modern weapons as they tackle the security challenges facing the country.
Although the authorities of the Nigerian police have since come forward to deny that a strike action by its personnel is imminent, because there is no smoke without fire, Nigerians must be greatly alarmed.
For all its shortcomings, and there are many, the Nigerian police remains a key security and law enforcement agency in the country, and a crucial partner in the vision Nigeria has to beat back a security crisis that grows more menacing by the day.
For the very rough row they have been given to hoe in the country as it is today, personnel of the Nigerian police work under absolutely shocking conditions. In these days which terrorists sponsored by some well-heeled but ill-meaning Nigerians bear sophisticated weapons, it beggars belief that personnel of the Nigerian police force still tot outdated weapons. It is no surprise then that their body count continues to rise.
When they fall in the line of duty, their families are mostly abandoned to their fate with too little done to mend their broken hearts.
The federal government and the authorities of the Nigerian police must not be mistaken. They may have successfully doused the flames of any impending strike action by the personnel of the police, but unless the conditions of work in the police force improve and quickly too, any respite got from dousing the tension will be replaced by the cataclysmic embarrassment and dire effects of an unprecedented protest actions by such a key cog in Nigeria`s efforts to beat back wildly rampaging insecurity.
Kene Obiezu,
keneobiezu@gmail.com
