Human rights activist, Mr. Femi Falana (SAN) yesterday called for state police in Nigeria, but said it must be democratised in order to rule out its abuse by state governors.
In his words, Falana while speaking at Kaakaki, an early morning television programme on the African Independent Television (AIT) said “if police councils at state levels are composed of key interest groups, including credible civil society organisations, it will invest confidence in the system and goes a long way in addressing the security challenges currently affecting the country.”
In 2005, Mr. Falana had strongly disagreed with Former Governor of Abia State, Dr. Orji Uzor Kalu on the creation of State Police, when Kalu called for its creation under the then President Olusegun Obasanjo. Falana was of the opinion that Governors will influence the said State Police and use them against their political enemies.
In his reply then, Kalu was of the view that a Governor cannot stay in office for more than eight years, which implies that governors will have limited influence on the Police even if there will be any at all.
This word of Falana has vindicated the ex-Gov again when he said, “We need to have a State Police, We cannot police the country the way we are going about it. The Police must be democratised if we are to adequately tackle the security challenges of this country”.
According to one of his aides; Dr. Kalu had seen into the Nigerian future eight years ago when he made the call for creation of State Police, though he was opposed, but now everyone is clamouring for it. Today Kalu is again calling for urgent attention to be given in creating jobs for the teeming Nigerian Youths to avoid the kind of cataclysm that took over the Arab work recently and the country is not paying attention to it until it happens.
We must all be aware that when Orji Kalu was the Governor in Abia State, he warned about the environmental degradation going on in the Niger Delta and the need to constructively engage and empower the Young men in that area, but he was ignored; the resultant effect was the hostilities we all saw in that region until former President Yar’Adua intervened with the Amnesty program.
Kalu also went then to all the Northern states to speak against the killing of the Igbos in that part of the country; telling the world that if the killings then was not arrested, that it could lead to a uncontrollable situation which will affect the entire Nation. Today we are all witnesses to what is going on with the Boko Haram.
It is very unfortunate that this country Nigeria have not seen the potentials inherent in Orji Kalu and how to positively tap these potentials. This is what somebody described recently in an article as “Mis-Management of Orji Kalu” Let us eschew unnecessary rivalry, politics of acrimony and start making positive use of genuine leaders and patriots in this country. In the United States, when a statesman makes a comment, the Government listens and properly analyse his comments to identify positive contents of such comments; but in Nigeria we just wave it away with the left hand if it does not come from the Government functionaries or friends of ‘the oga at the top’.
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