Your Excellency,
 |
| NOPRIN Cordinator, Okechukwu Nwanguma |
The
Network on Police Reform in Nigeria (NOPRIN) is a network of 49 civil society
organizations spread across Nigeria, and committed to promoting police
accountability and respect for human rights.
It was established in 2000 to
provide opportunity for civil society input to police reform, and the
enhancement of safety, security and justice in Nigeria.
NOPRIN is constrained to address this letter to
you following several complaints it has received from aggrieved police officers
of the Nigeria Police Force from across the country concerning alleged
irregularities and corrupt practices in police recruitment and promotion
exercises. For ease of reference and illustration, we have reproduced
hereunder, unedited, some complaints we have so far received from different
groups of police officers from different states within the last one week alone.
We are also prompted to write to you in order to
draw your attention, once again, to the lingering issue of the integrity gap in
leadership and inefficiency of the Police Service Commission (PSC). As
presently constituted, the PSC is hampered to effectively carry out its mandate
as a civilian external oversight mechanism for the NPF, to ensure
accountability by perpetrators and redress for victims of the numerous public
complaints of police human rights abuse, corruption and
misconduct. A
radical overhaul of its procedures and composition is warranted.
 |
| PSC chairman, Mike Okiro |
 |
| Buhari |
 |
| IGP, Idris |
- ALLEGED IRREGULARITIES IN POLICE PROMOTION
Police promotion has remained a vexed issue
within the Nigeria Police system. However, grievances and grumblings have
increased recently among police officers who allege that they are short-changed
and left behind in promotions due to alleged irregularities founded on favoritism,
illicit connections with influence peddlers, corruption and other mundane
considerations.
Within the last two months prior to the exit of
former IGP Solomon Arase, there were no less than three police promotion
exercises in row- of various ranks, but mainly of Inspectors and Cadet
Inspectors promoted to Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP). As at April
29, 2016 a newspaper report quoted Arase to have ‘revealed that in all, over 39,000 personnel
nationwide were promoted from various ranks to higher ranks’. More promotions
were reported after this.
The Police Service Commission (PSC) is
statutorily charged with police recruitment, promotion and discipline. However,
the IGP promotes certain ranks and recommends and sends lists of police
officers to be promoted to the PSC for consideration.
However, there have been persistent grudging and
grumbling among police officers over alleged discrimination and injustice in
promotion. They claim that their mates and juniors are promoted above them in
successive promotions, and that some of them have had to stagnate on the same
rank for as long as 15 years and more. They say they feel depressed and demoralized.
Allegations are rife that police promotion
process is flagrantly circumvented and standards are compromised by political
interference and corruption and that it favours certain officers (who may be
connected or can buy their way through) to the disadvantage of others (who
don’t have ‘godfathers’ and can’t afford to buy promotions for themselves). It
is alleged that some police personnel exploit their illicit connections with
big politicians, government officials and men and women of influence in society
to benefit from what ought to be earned by merit, as of right, and without
discrimination or bias. This calls for a prompt, impartial and exhaustive
investigation.
- POLICE RECRUITMENT
NOPRIN has also been receiving complaints from
applicants and relatives of applicants currently undergoing screening for
police recruitment across the country that some ‘officials’ are demanding the
sum of no less than forty thousand naira (N40,000) from each of them as inducement
to facilitate their recruitment into the NPF. There is the need to ensure a
close and strict monitoring of the ongoing police recruitment process to
insulate the process from the corruptive influence of certain elements that
over the years have ensured that the process is compromised thereby making it possible
for unsuitable characters to find their way into the police. It is such
undesirable characters that constitute the source of the image crisis that the
police have faced over the years, as well as pose threat to public safety and
security.
It would be recalled that former President
Obasanjo upon assuming office in 1999 after nearly 16 unbroken years of
military rule during which there were no police recruitments, had ordered a
massive recruitment drive to make up for the shortfall in police manpower. The
plan to recruit 40,000 each year between 2001 and 2004 was truncated when after
the exercise in 2001, Obasanjo had to again order a moratorium on further
recruitment. He stated that the process was marred by corruption which allowed ‘criminals
and misfits to find their way into the police’. An audit revealed that many of
the recruits hired proxies and mercenaries who stood for them during the
screening. Many did not have the basic qualification and presented either fake
certificates or the certificates of others. Most of them paid various sums of
money in bribe to be recruited. This explains why there are many armed robbers,
kidnappers and sundry criminals within the police force.
PSC’S INEFFICIENCY AS CIVILIAN EXTERNAL OVERSIGHT
MECHANISM
There have been several calls on President Buhari
to reorganise the PSC and ensure that its leadership and procedures meet the
standards of integrity, credibility and operational efficiency, and that equity
and fair play characterise its operations and functions.
The time has come for President Buhari to heed
the repeated calls to reorganise the PSC, particularly, to ensure that the
commission's leadership composition is constituted in accordance with the law
establishing the commission, and with a view to ensuring that the commission
discharges its functions effectively and with integrity.
The removal of the current Chairman of the PSC,
Mr. Mike Okiro is long overdue considering that his integrity deficit has robbed
off negatively on the credibility and operational effectiveness of the
commission. Besides recurrent allegations of corruption against him by police
officers, there are numerous documented cases of misconduct against him,
especially, the numerous unresolved corruption cases, in addition to other reasons
adduced which make him unsuitable to be appointed in the first place, as head
of a credible, civilian external oversight mechanism for the Nigeria Police.
Okechukwu Nwanguma
National Coordinator
08064974531
……………..
Please, find below, some of the complaints NOPRIN received from police
officers.
COMPAINT 1:
Dear Sir,
IRREGULARITIES/CONTROVERSIES IN PROMOTIONS OF CADET INSPECTORS TO ASP
BY POLICE SERVICE COMMISSION/ RETIRED IGP SOLOMON ARASE.
An interview/selection board was conducted in all the 12 zones of the
Nigeria Police across the nation where over 13,000 inspectors including the
cadets of 2009 and 2010 attended the board in September 2015 where over 9,000
inspectors were recommended including all the cadets.
To our greatest dismay some cadet inspectors were promoted to ASP
while others were left unpromoted by Police Service Commission(PSC)
/Retired Inspector-General of Police IGP Solomon Arase with a reason
that was not known to us but discovery showed that the promotion was done based
on racism, marginalization, ethnicity, relationship, i.e. who do you
know/relate to.
The worst of the irregularity done in the promotion was that, some
inspectors promoted in 2011 and 2012 respectively were promoted to the rank of
Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP), leaving some cadet inspector of
2009/2010 behind. During the National retirement broadcast of IGP Solomon Arase
(Retired), he said that he had promoted all inspectors to the rank of ASP till
2010, i.e. he had cleared inspectors to the rank of Assistant Superintendent of
Police (ASP) rank up till 2010 but many inspectors were left unpromoted.
NOTE: The question is, whether:
(a). Cadet Inspectors promoted to the rank of Assistant Superintendent
of Police (ASP) are more equal than the unpromoted Cadet Inspectors?
(b). Do they perform extra duties more than the unpromoted inspectors?
(c) Do they have more clean records than unpromoted ones?
PRAYERS
(a). May we, the remaining unpromoted Cadet Inspectors of
2009 and 2010 be promoted to same rank of Assistant Superintendent
of Police (ASP) as done to our fellow counterparts.
(b). May the promotion signal carry same date of promotion
so to enable same mates go together, i.e. back dating the promotion to 1st Jan.
2016.
Thank you.
Complaining Inspector.
COMPLAINT 2
Dear Sir,
I believe this is the only
medium that will help us to reveal the humiliating and cheating in the
recent promotion of INSPECTORS to ASP ll in the Nigerian Police Force which was
based on corruption. We went for board interview after the request by force HQ
to promote inspectors to the next rank Asp II. Most of the officers slated for
promotion have spent 5, 6,7,8,9 years respectively. About six thousand plus
went for the board interview and only three thousand plus were considered for
promotion in the first list which comes out in most national dailies we had
that they use quota system which had been abolished long ago by the then Parry
Osayande, former PSC Chairman. The present management of PSC and the POLICE had
reinvented the use of quota system in promoting inspectors to Asp ll which is
humiliating and demoralising.
And now another list of
promotion is out again of which the same Quota system was applied. Meanwhile in
the list we saw a situation whereby in the same state junior was been promoted
while the senior is left out. With high expectations, we got
disappointment in the name of quota system. It is painful to see
your fellow colleagues recruited the same day, the same board interview to be
your senior as if you have committed an offence that deprive you of your
statutory right, especially after serving your country as patriotic citizen.
The big questions are; what will be the morale of the victimized ones
after spending more than five years? Are they really using federal character
during recruitment? Are they not going to recruit INSPECTOR or ASP in the
proposed 10,000 police recruitment? Is promotion a right after hard work? Is
police not observing any of the federal civil service rules? What will the
public expect from a police officer that is traumatized emotionally by such
promotion saga and inequality? So sad to say that the leaders who is vested
with the responsibility to move the police to a greater height are introducing
more problem to the force. Failure to promote those who are due for promotion
will not only affect him alone, but his family. A situation were junior is now
the senior, indiscipline will reign without any benefit of doubt and naturally
it kills the moral of officers. The federal government is working tirelessly in
promoting and repositioning the force through various reforms. If the house is
not in order, what will you expect the public to get from us?
We are pleading with the
Presidency, Judiciary and the Legislatives to investigate the irregularities in
the last promotion of INSPECTOR to ASPII using QUOTA SYSTEM. We are Nigerian
and belief that Nigeria is one. If nothing is been done as soon as
possible, I doubt it if police will still remain friends to the public as you
know frustration can make man to misbehave. And besides his misbehavior it
tells much on his health as his blood pressure arises and that can shorten his
life.
Please kindly help us out.
Thanks in anticipations
COMPLAINT 3
BIASE AND
LOPSIDED PROMOTION IN NIGERIA POLICE
Hello sir,
I am writing on behalf of inspectors of police affected by the recent
promotion released by the Nigeria police, this September last year inspectors
on confirmed on or before December 2012 were called to attend inspector
promotion board, and we were recommended for promotion by the zonal AIGs who
interviewed us during the board interview. When the promotion was released
January 2016, if was filled with so many irregularities, most of my course
mates from some certain states from the north were promoted while majority of
us were not promoted, sir, we all joined the force on the same date, we passed
out from training on same day, and we also went for board on the same day, we
have the same qualification and we were all recommended for promotion, please
could you help us ask the Nigeria police the criteria used for the promotion?
Am writing you now sir because police have done what they did January 2016,
they have done it again for the second time, somebody needs to fight for us and
ask the police authorities questions, my course mates were promoted ahead of me
January 2016, and I and some of us were not promoted, June 3rd 2016, another signal of
promotion was released, for the second time sir, my course mates were promoted
and some of us were left out, please sir, how are we suppose to live like this?
Police are doing this because we can’t really complain, since they say it is a
criminal offence, they call it mutiny, but please since we can’t fight for us,
please seek justice for us.
Help us ask our IGP
this question sir “ if what has happened
to these affected police officers happens to me, how will I feel” my father
will say this is man’s inhumanity to man, finally they released another set of
promotion from inspector to ASPS and they call it special promotion, using it
as a medium to promote inspectors who did not even attend promotion board, and most of them are our far far juniors in
to us that are qualified, they left is behind and promote their own people and
those that bribed them with money, please sir, what is special promotion? What
special service did they render? Did they fight with boko haram or what? This
is corruption of the highest order, please we are in pains, help us, fight for
us, God will not come down to fight for his people, God will use people like
you to fight for us…thanks on behalf of all inspectors affected
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