By Emmanuel Oloniruha
Presidential Candidate of the National Rescue Movement (NRM), Dr Esther Okereke, says adoption of community policing and state police are critical solutions to Nigeria’s security challenges.
Okereke said this when she appeared on the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) personality interview series on Sunday in Abuja.
She advised the Federal Government to rethink the country security framework, and invest in localised defence mechanisms to ensure the safety of lives and property across the country.
Okereke said that local security personnel were best positioned to defend their communities due to their deep understating of the local terrains.
She added that effective intelligence gathering and swift response mechanisms could only be achieved by empowering those at the grassroots level.
“I have said it before: Community policing is key. Equip the community vigilance groups, the forest guards, the hunters, fund and train them.
“Nobody can defend the community better from those that know the terrains,’’ Okereke said.
The NRM presidential flagbearer likened local crime to insider sabotage, describing community policing as one of the best mechanisms not only to weed out local collaborators, but effectively tackle the menace.
“My mother used to say that it is the rat inside the house that tells the one outside that there is fish in the basket,” she said.
Okereke expressing her support for the establishment of state police, dismissed the fears that state governors would abuse such initiative.
She said that the use of structural checks and balances, a strict chain of command, and clear jurisdictional boundaries would help to prevent political overreach in a decentralised policing system.
“There are clauses, they have their jurisdictions. They have who they report to. They have the chain of command. You can’t just come and say, Oh, I give all the veto power to the state to do everything or take your decision. No.
“When we say fund it, empower them does not mean you should give them the whole power to make decisions, to carry out judgment and sentences, no. It’s not done like that.
“Even in the federal, you can’t do it like that. I mean, that’s why you still have chain of command starting from the president down to the grassroots.
“It should still be like that. Still curb and curtail what they can do and what they cannot do. It’s as simple as that,’’ Okereke said.(NAN)(NAN)
OBE/FEO
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Edited by Francis Onyeukwu
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