When the present Inspector General of Police, Mohammed Abubakar, took
over the mantle of leadership as the number one policeman in Nigeria,
he had stepped onto the seat with an agenda. It became apparent that one
thing uppermost in Abubakar’s mind was to rebrand the Nigeria Police
Force and in doing so, hopefully change Nigerians’ stereo-typed
perception of the police force. But it seemed like, no matter how hard
Abubakar tries to rebrand his men and the force, some atrocious
behaviors of his personnel, continue to make his efforts futile. If they
are not flouting the check point order, they are busy recklessly
pulling the trigger and killing innocent people, including children.
Late Ozuah with new bride
Abubakar’s attention needs to be drawn to the indiscriminate shooting
of innocent people by his men. On June, 13, 2013, nine-year-old
Timilehin Ebun was in his father’s car, when a stray bullet fired by a
police sergeant at the Ketu/Mile 12 axis, hit and killed him. It was
later heard that a team of policemen was trying to stop a fleeing
commercial bus driver, who had flouted traffic law. Since they could not
arrest the driver at the spot, who had bolted, they had attempted to
shoot him, but instead got the little boy. Nigerians are yet to come out
of their shock over the gruesome murder of late Ibrahim Momodu by a
female Divisional Police Officer (DPO), in Benin City, when they were
hit by the news of Timilehin’s death by another police personnel.
ibrahim-momodu
Momodu, an undergraduate, was said to have been killed on May, 27,
2013, by Carol Afegbua, the DPO of Ogida Police Station who claimed
Momodu was shot because her men ordered him to stop, but he refused. She
also claimed that she shot the deceased in self defence. Counsel to
the deceased’s family, Barr. Jefferson Uwoghiren, said verifiable
evidences have shown that Momodu was not shot and killed at the check
point when he was stopped along Siluko Road on the night of the
incident. According to the lawyer, the deceased was arrested alive and
taken to the Ogida Police Station by the DPO, whom he claimed had for
sometime be on the lookout for the student. This insisted the lawyer;
contradicted police claim that the student was killed inevident that
Momodu was arrested, dragged to station, beaten, before he was shot.
The first photo, showed Momodu lying on the ground and trying to protect
his face with a hand, probably from those beating him. No sign of
blood was seen on his clothes, showing that he still had not been shot.
The photo contradicted evidence available on the exhumed body of the
murdered student. He told journalists that the exhumed body had blood
all over the clothes, showing that the first photo was taken before the
shooting.
Abiodun-Ademola
The-slain-Timilehin-Solomon-Ebun.
The second photo, of the autopsy, showed bullet holes on his body,
indicating that he was shot in the chest thrice and once in the leg. The
bullets pierced through the heart, perforating his back. The lawyer
also showed another photo, of another boy who was also summarily
executed by the same Ogida Police Station. If Momodu was shot in self
defence as claimed by the trigger happy DPO, who should know better as a
mother, was he also buried secretly in self defence? When the body of
the 22-year-old undergraduate was exhumed from the shallow grave where
he was buried, he was still clad in the T-shirt and jeans which he was
wearing on the night he was murdered. As if that was the ongoing trend
among Abubakar’s men in recent days, some riot policemen who were called
to restore normalcy as students protest at Michael Otedola College of
Education, June, 17, 2013, ended up inflaming the protest as four out
of the protesting student were shot by the police.
Kausarat killed by police
These cases are just few out of the many shooting and killings
committed by some of these trigger happy policemen. As if the Boko Haram
war is bad enough to contend with, police also appeared to be waging
war with those they are supposed to protect. If Abubakar truly hopes to
arrest this galloping trend of his policemen and women shooting at the
slightest provocation, then he should make retraining of his men vital
indices in his administration. Training and retraining of his men in
areas of arms handling, should no longer be an exercise of lip service.
People, children are needlessly being killed. The men should be taught
to stop indiscriminate shootings, especially in public places. The
police top hierarchy is always fond of saying that, ‘it’s better to
allow 10 thousand armed robbers to escape, than to kill one innocent
civilian.’ They should begin to embrace and practice that maxim.
Some of these men should be subjected to psychiatric examination
before being enlisted into the police force to ascertain the state of
their minds. Perhaps reckless shooting will reduce if police work
schedules are looked into. Some work more, but earn less, while others
work less but earn more. Sometimes, a policeman is forced to work 72
hours stretch. He looks haggard, bloody eyes and weary to the bones.
He’s like a coiled snake, waiting to strike. Several times, Nigerians
have been told that a policeman who killed had been charged to court or
dismissed. But are they really dismissed and remained dismissed? Many of
them are transferred out of the state were the crimes are committed, to
continue their police work somewhere else by their god fathers pushing
buttons. And those who are genuinely dismissed, simply gets recruited
back into the force. This is so easy because there is no database to
check or know those who had been dismissed or why they had been
dismissed, thus the killer comes back to join the bandwagon and the
vicious circles begins all over again.
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