The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), a civil rights advocacy group, has advised President Bola Tinubu against wasting limited public funds on forming a presidential commission on police reform.
The rights group based its recommendations on the justification that overhauling the country’s failing police force is not a “meal is ready” task for political insiders.
In a statement released on Thursday, HURIWA urged Tinubu to assign his cabinet-level officials—including the National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu, and the Federal Attorney General and Minister of Justice—as well as other ministers whose official responsibilities overlap with national security to collaboratively compile and present the numerous, varied reports on police reforms that have been written and presented to the Nigerian government between 1999 and 2015. This should be done without using additional budgetary funds.
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“In reality, government is in possession of very large volumes of multifaceted reports compiled by eminent scholars on security including technocrats, former Inspectors General of Police, and top-rated civil rights practitioners. HURIWA views the setting up of the presidential committee as recently announced, as another attempt to spend public funds for just some politicians to embark on a meaningless voyage of discovery and a jamboree,” the statement made available to PlatinumPost by HURIWA national coordinator, Emmanuel Onwubiko, said.
In addition, the group claimed that committees on police reforms had been established by nearly every federal administration, from President Olusegun Obasanjo to Goodluck Jonathan. “Just as the 9th session of the National Assembly recommended the setting up of State Police, it seemed this far reaching measures to upgrade policing standards in Nigeria, were all thrown into the dustbins of Federal government archives,” the group said.
HURIWA noted that, just moments previously, the governor of Bauchi state, Bala Mohammed, had announced the formation of a police reform committee to reporters at the State House following the conclusion of Tuesday’s Nigeria Police Council meeting, which was presided over by Tinubu.
It will be remembered that the council at that meeting confirmed Kayode Egbetokun as the official Inspector-General of Police (IGP).
Mohammed claims that Ibrahim Geidam, the minister of police affairs; Solomon Arase, the chairman of the Police Service Commission (PSC); AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq, the governor of Kwara and head of the Nigerian Governors’ Forum (NGF); and Nuhu Ribadu, the national security adviser (NSA) are among the committee members.
