Calabar monarch warns that state police will make governors uncontrollable dictators

MURI Munene of the Efuts nation and paramount ruler of Calabar south His Royal Highness Professor Itam Hogan Itam has warned that the currently clamour for state police could be dangerous as it could breed an uncontrollable dictatorship.

Over recent months, Nigeria has been plagued with insecurity as kidnapping, armed robbery, attacks by armed Fulani cattle herdsmen and communal violence wrack the nation. This had led to calls for state police forces to be allowed so governors have the capacity to combat the problems locally.

However, there are fears that if state police forces are introduced, Nigeria's 36 governors will use them as private armies to settle political scores and deal with opponents. Adding his voice to calls for caution, Professor Itam has warned that the establishment of state police forces will likely breed dictatorships.

He said: “It would give the state governors more power to deal with the people negatively, leading to dictatorship in governance in the states. I was a young man in the sixties when there was state police, we called it local government police but they were extremely wicked and government functionaries used them to perpetrate evil and killing.

“During political era, governors sent them to kill their enemies and opposition and people’s lives were in danger. These police were under the control of the governors and they used them effectively to achieve their aims."

Professor Itam said a state police force is tantamount to giving governors extra power to flush out perceived enemies, deal with self-acclaimed opponents and anyone who does not support their administrations. He added that  he supports community police but this should remain under the control of the federal government via the inspector-general of police.

“I support community police but let it be under the control of a central authority with district police officers, commissioners, assistant inspector-generals of police, etc. If not, what happened then, will replicate itself now.

“Now that we have federal police, do you not see how they carry out the orders of the inspector-general of police and president who are their bosses? Nigerians of the sixties are not different from Nigerians of today as the state police would be official thugs of the governor, their bosses and they will do anything to please them," he added.

According to Professor Itam, any Nigerian with power is something else. He added that when the public start having confidence in the police, three quarters of the work is done.

“Please let us maintain this unity form of police and later, we can form community police where there will be a lot of training and advocacies and the police will know the people in the community and the community will know them. With advocacies and trainings, the people will accept the police as their own and work with them and the police too will accept the people in the community as their own and work with them.

“Most Nigerians hate police and some people will like to stay without police. We need a lot of confidence building but I will prefer community police to state police, so we don’t give the governors more power to deal with the people,” the monarch added.