Police Urged to Establish Data Base On Officers' Misconduct

[Richard Akindele]

Participants at a national workshop on Strengthening Police Internal Complaints Systems in Nigeria have called on the authorities to establish and maintain a dataase on complaints against police misconduct. This would help track men and officers who misbehave in the line of duty and are subjects of high numbers of citizens' complaints.

A communiqué issued at the end of the workshop held in Abuja which was made available to THISDAY, noted that the production of a handbook or booklets on the disciplinary mechanisms which can access them would also assist the populace as well as correct the bad image about the Nigeria Police.

According to the communiqué signed by Alhaji A.A. Shamaki, Deputy Director, Police Performance Monitoring Unit (PPMU) and Innocent Chukwuma, Executive Director, CLEEN Foundation, some of the challenges militating against a virile complaint system in the Nigeria Police include; inadequate funding of internal complaints and disciplinary structures of the Nigeria Police Force, multiplicity of internal complaints mechanisms, some of which work at cross-purposes; and inadequate training and knowledge in both the Nigeria Police Force and Police Service Commission regarding misconduct and public complaints.

Other factors include , excessive interference by influential members of the public in the complaints, investigation and redress procedures of the Nigeria Police Force, absence of a database on complaints against police misconduct, which militates against effective tracking of offences and offenders; inadequate understanding of police internal complaints and disciplinary mechanisms by members of the public and, consequently, their inability to take recourse to such mechanisms, lack of awareness about the processes and procedures for reducing police misconduct by both members of the Nigeria Police Force and the ordinary citizen and absence of a reward system to encourage policemen and policewomen who show outstanding performance in handling complaints against the Nigeria Police Force.

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