OPINION: Weak Police Commission by EMMANUEL ONWUBIKO

A fundamental cog in the wheel of democratic pro­gress in Nigeria is the availability of a plethora of agencies and multiplication of Federal government funded commissions and institutions that exist only on the paper on which their enabling laws are writ­ten.

Most federal government’s funded agencies are simply operating like money guzzling machines in such a way that huge recurrent expenditures are made annually but without these agencies adding value to the living standards of Nigerians or even pro­moting good governance.
It is for the existence of too many agencies that deplete the much needed financial resources that most persons have clamoured for comprehensive restructuring and merger.
In the past Presidential committees have been set to restructure the over bloated bureaucracy of the Federal Government but till date too many agencies that exists even some of them with overlapping functions are still costing the tax payers billions of cash to run these grossly inefficient agencies.
A case in point is the Police Service Commission (PSC) which has existed over the years but has not satisfactorily discharged the thematic mandates for which it was established.
To be fair to the founders of the Po­lice Service Commission this agency is strategic given the poor records of dis­cipline and unprofessionalism within the Nigeria Police force but due to human and political factors this com­mission has remained dormant, inef­fective and inefficient but nevertheless billions of cash are funnelled yearly to run this lazy and weakened agency.
The Police Service Commission is such money guzzling machine to such a ridiculous extent that it has so far failed to instill strict discipline and pro­fessionalism across the ranks and files of the Nigeria Police Force.
For many years that this Police Ser­vice Commission has existed, it has failed to check the excesses and the gross indiscipline of the operatives and officers of the Nigeria Police Force to an extent that in all known surveys car­ried out on transparency, accountabil­ity and professional discipline, the Po­lice has consistently ranked the lowest.
The Police Force has come under increasing accusations of committing gross human rights breaches includ­ing extra-legal executions. The recruit­ment mechanisms put in place by this body is at best corrupt and heav­ily compromised just as the process of promotions are bribes influenced sub­stantially. Accusations of bribery have continued to mar the commission.
Established under the Police Ser­vice Commission (establishment) Act of 2001 Number 1, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, the Police Ser­vice Commission is empowered to discipline and dismiss indicted Police operatives and officers.
The failure to discharge the func­tions as provided for by the law is fundamentally blamed on the lack of charisma on the persons picked to administer the Police Service Com­mission.
Criticism over the unusual conven­tion of appointment of retired senior police officers to head this body has not abated and the inability of the suc­cessive leadership to think out of the box and introduce innovative solu­tions to the malaise afflicting the Police as an institution has validated the call for a non-police but vastly competent Nigerian of high repute to be made the Chairman of the Police Service Com­mission.
The current chairman is a retired Inspector General of Police Mike Oki­ro but there are clear evidence that the PSC has yet to get it right.
Those close to him blames poor funding for the lack of pro-activeness in implementation of the mandates of the commission.
Lack of sufficient fund is no justifi­cation for poor performance.
If the leadership is willing to work and partner with like minds in the organised civil society community it would have made better impacts.
Few years back, the Nigeria Police was remarkably blamed for the ex­tralegal killings of over five thousand detainees in different Police detention centers.
The United Nations Special Rap­porteur on extra-judicial killings and torture even visited different Police detention facilities in Nigeria and re­turned extensively damaging allega­tions against the Police.
Recently, Amnesty International issued its 2016/2017 World Human Rights Report and the Nigeria Police ranks top amongst the worst violators of Human Rights.
Amnesty International wrote thus: “On 9th February 2016, soldiers and police officers shot at about 200 mem­bers of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) who had gathered for a prayer meeting at the National High School in Aba, Abia State. Video footage showed soldiers shooting at peace­ful and unarmed IPOB members; at least 17 people were killed and scores injured.”
This report is besides the hundreds of members of IPOB killed in the last one year by Police for protesting peace­fully.
The United Nations Special Rap­porteur on Torture went as far as identifying Police detention centers as killing fields.
Sadly, the Police Service Commis­sion put in place to instill discipline amongst the Police is more interested in allegedly collecting bribes from lawless Police operatives to set them free and to engage in bribes-for-pro­motion of Police officers (allegedly).
The Police Service Commission has failed to set up forensic laboratory to enable investigators to carry out sci­ence-based investigations when cases of Police brutality and extra-legal ex­ecutions are reported.
The above compromised mindset of the Police Service Commission has understandably made most Nigerians to wonder the essence of setting up such an ombudsman that consumes billions of financial resources of tax payers but refuses to carry out its core mandate.
These questions are coming against the backdrop of the fact that the law establishing the Police Ser­vice Commission has clothed it with the requisite functions and powers to sanitize the policing institution.
Why keep an agency that willfully refuses to carry out its core mandate or is it that the President of Nigeria and the National Assembly members benefit by the deliberate disfunction­ality of the Police Service Commis­sion?
The above fact is critical because of the political infighting that has played out recently when the Mike Okiro-led Police Service Commission could not independently recruit the ten thousand Police operatives because both the Presidency officials and the National Assembly all have their pre­ferred candidates.
There’s no respect for merit and competence in the recruitment and promotion of police operatives.
Only politics and bribes are al­leged as the key determinant factors. Let the commission prove me wrong with facts and figures.
There are accusations that the Po­lice Service Commission has per­petuated the dominance of a section of the country in the top echelons of the Police Force to such an extent that most people in the South East see the Nigeria Police Force as the Northern Police Force.
Nigeria must restructure the po­lice to create local and state Police.

– Emmanuel Onwubiko is Head of HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA (HURIWA) and blogs @www.huriwa@blogspot.com;www. em­manuelonwubiko.com.