One issue that has dotted the Nigerian polity and is assuming a dangerous dimension in recent times is that of extra-judicial killings by policemen.
On Saturday April 13, 2019, a police inspector serving with Lagos State Police Command reportedly shot two people – a man and a young lady – who were said to be returning from a night club.
The victims were attacked by the team of policemen comprising two inspectors and four sergeants who were allegedly responsible for the murder of a 21-year-old lady, Adaobi Ifeanyi, who lost her life on the spot while the man, Emmanuel Akomafuwa (32), was admitted in a hospital due to injuries sustained from the gunshots.
The Police authority, however, immediately swung into action and arrested five of its personnel – Inspector Adamu Usman, Sergeant Adeyeye Adeoye, Sergeant Kashim Tijani, Sergeant Lucky Akigbe and Sergeant Paul Adeoye – while the sixth man, Inspector Dania Ojo, fled the scene and has been declared wanted.
This came barely two weeks after policemen from the Anti-Cultism Unit shot and killed a South African returnee, Kolade Johnson, at Onipetesi area, Mangoro, on the Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway, while the victim was watching a match between two British Premiership sides – Tottenham and Liverpool – at a viewing centre in company of his friends.
Johnson’s only sin was that he appealed to the policemen not to take away a man they arrested for sporting dreadlocks. One of the policemen, an inspector, reportedly shouted: “I will kill somebody; I will kill somebody,” before he started shooting and cut down Johnson in his prime.
Police brutality leading to killing is not new. In 1987, a policeman shot and killed the Daodu brothers on the Lagos Island. On June 7, 2005, in Apo district, a satellite settlement at the Federal Capital Territory in Abuja, five young spare parts dealers and a young woman were killed by policemen, allegedly on the orders of a serving Deputy Commissioner of Police. Two policemen in the matter were later sentenced to life imprisonment.
More recently, in September 2015, a police corporal attached to Isheri-Osun Division in Lagos shot at a moving tricycle on Isheri-Ijegun Road, killing the wife of the tricyclist, Mrs. Idongesit Ekpo, on the spot and injuring her husband, Mr. Godwin Ekpo.
Barely three months later, a drunken policeman, identified as Stephen James, shot and killed twin brothers and one of their friends at a hotel in the Ketu area of Lagos. The victims were identified as Taiwo and Kehinde Oyesunle, while their friend was known simply as Jeje. The twins were the only children of their mother.
The list of those who have been mowed down by police in Lagos and other parts of the country is endless and it beats our imagination that in this time and age, some policemen, trained in weapon handling and respective orders governing the use of weapons, could descend to such abysmal level to display disrespect for sanctity of life and get involved in sheer criminality.
Without any equivocations, we warn in strong terms that these actions are inhuman, sadistic, criminal and grossly unacceptable. And coming at a period of a global movement towards people-oriented community policing, we say this is unacceptable and the culprits must be brought to justice.
While we commend the Nigeria Police Force for taking action, in line with its internal control mechanism on the various extra-judicial killings, we found it inconceivable that a force, which promised to serve and protect with integrity, could get involved in such pattern of killing in the modern times.
Given the fact that over the years scores of policemen have been jailed for extrajudicial killings, we found it inexplicable that such convictions have not elicited better weapon-handling practice among Nigerian policemen. We, therefore, call for sustained reorientation for the rank and file as well as officers of the Force on the need for restraint before shooting. The age-long Force Order 237, which stipulates circumstances when weapons should be used, should be adequately ingrained in the DNA of our policemen.
Of equal importance is the need to ensure a better police-civilian relationship, particularly in the 21st Century, not just because it is an anathema for innocent people to be shot dead on frivolous suspicion, but because the police need public support to succeed in their onerous task of ridding the society of criminals.
It is also high time the Force introduced compulsory psychiatric evaluation for new entrants and a periodic one for its rank and file as well as officers, in order to detect early signs of psychiatric instability in them.
We commend the Acting Inspector-General of Police (IG), Mohammed Adamu, for coming to Lagos on the heels of the recent killings to condole with the victims’ families and especially his promise that the Force would no longer condone atrocities of police personnel involved in misuse of firearms, as they would be charged with murder.
Beyond the orderly room trial and dismissal of killer cops, they must be expeditiously tried in court and, if found guilty, face the consequences to reduce, if not eliminate, this obnoxious practice.
This is necessary to tame the menace of extra-judicial killings by the police
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