NIGERIAN POLICE AND DUTIES ASCRIBED TO THEM

Ordinarily, if I am to describe the commonest duty of an average Police Officer, from the peripheral of what could be seen, by an average Nigerian like me? Then I would say, they are meant to be at every Bus Stop, collecting tolls from bus conductors, and controlling traffic.

They also seem to harass travelers journeying with oversized luggage or trucks with loads, especially the ones that refuses to ‘settle’. And maybe, to check random Vehicle particulars.

What surprises me is that, no matter how legally unruly your case may be, talking about driving with incomplete, or expired vehicle documents or other supposed offences, you are effortlessly left off their hook , as soon as you rub their palms. But in the event of you wanting to display your fluency in English language, they have their delay tactics to make you pay in kind, obviously with your time. I also noticed that citizens with a stint of ‘I know my right kind of craze’, like Lawyers, Media Personnel, or Human Right Activist, all of whom are capable of creating hullabaloo, gets easily freed unlike others.

However, my main concern here though, is how Police Officers exaggerate orders from higher authorities, humiliating helpless members of the public in the process.

I remember the era, when policemen randomly pick suspected criminals at strategic spots. We call it picking of ‘roger’ in local parlance. Common sense dictates that, places like brothels, motels, hemp joints, bet-junctions etc are where they should check for possible existence of hoodlums/criminals.

Instead, what we experience was police vans that violently pull over in places where young men are gathered, and all of a sudden, starts effecting arrest without shadowing or questioning. It was so common then, to see youths scampering for safety and injuring them in the process. The unlucky ones caught are locked up, incredible amount of money charged as bail, while families rally round to cough it out.

The funniest of such was one of the cases recorded in my neighborhood. I was much younger then, but remember very vividly. This couple were on their way to a family event, all decked in uniformed Ankara fabric with their two sons, and at a station to catch a bus. The wife recounted that the police van pulled over, as was rampant then (talking about mid-nineties). While everyone scampered to safety, the couple maintained their stance. The fact that they wore a uniform to denote that they were a family gave them confidence. That confidence must have infuriated these force men. The husband was thereafter singled out amidst his wife and kids, handcuffed, and whisked away as a suspected criminal. Which fraudster goes out to rob, dressed in the same clothing with his wife and children?

There was also a time when importation of rice was banned by the Obasanjo administration. The little knowledge I have says, Custom Officers are the most concerned in ensuring that this order is obeyed by being efficient in our borders. But pronto, our ‘very caring’ Police Officers took it upon themselves, to ensure that, even people who go to ketu market to buy four dericas, are confiscated to their station for not smelling snow, in the rice they purchased.

 Next was when motorcycle (okada) was banned from plying major highways in Lagos. Despite the fact that the ban wasn’t placed on not too busy roads and suburbs. Nigerian Police Men (Lagos Zone), swung into action, and it became a case of seizing every okada in sight. Even the ones not properly parked in front of residential buildings. It was that bad.

And now in recent times, the norm is to arrest any young, fresh looking man with laptop(s), supposedly wearing a gold chain, as a yahoo boy (internet fraudster). If the car he drives now has a tinted glass (regardless if he has a license), or if his hair is colored other than black, or unfortunately keeps a dread, then he is arrested, molested, before being extorted, and thereafter left off the hook.

So, what’s the point? The fraudster (if he truly was), gets to disintegrate into the society to continue ‘sinning’, while he devices ways to regularly settle the police. What menace are they curbing?

Attacking rich looking boys isn’t the way. Innocent lads had been dealt with in the past, just because they were ‘unlucky’ to be well fed, living large as a result of their legitimate hard work. Some took over their family businesses, hence wealthy. Others naturally like to adorn heavy gold chains. It makes them look like their singing idols, so why should they suffer over a mere look , which has never been an expression of one’s true character.

That the Nigerian Police Force, is the most mocked Government establishment, is enough reason to make them work more on their level of sanity, and then the integrity of that workforce. Thank God, killing of innocent citizens via stray bullets has reduced, greatly.

Despite the fact that bail is free, is an inscription on the walls of every police station in the country, it clearly contrasts with what is experienced in reality. And how the policemen at Obasanjo Police Station Ota, managed to switch me from the complainant, to being the accused on a case of assault last year January, still amazes me till date. I later got to know that the woman that assaulted me was a family friend to the DCO. Yet someone would tell me they aren’t corrupt too right?

Anyways, my suggestion is this. For clarity purposes, I am of the opinion that orders should be clearly written out in local languages for policemen/women, so as to understand the clauses beneath public instructions/bans, and subsequently the duties ascribed to them.

Don’t come and arrest me o. I’m in my house battling malaria.