JUDICIAL PANELS ON POLICE BRUTALITY

The outcome should produce a police force that is friendly, humane and functional

In the wake of the nationwide ‘EndSARS’ protests by young Nigerians last October, the federal government directed each of the 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) to establish judicial panels of inquiry into allegations of brutality and extrajudicial killings against the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) and other police units. Twenty eight of those states, according to Vice President Yemi Osinbajo who is coordinating the panels, have completed their assignments. But only eight of them have turned in their reports. Seven states (Borno, Jigawa, Kano, Kebbi, Sokoto, Yobe and Zamfara) did not establish any panels either because they have no such problem or their authorities do not care.

It is unfortunate that neither the federal government nor the states took the issue seriously thus confirming the cynicism of the youths that the idea was simply to stall. The panels were initially mandated to end hearing petitions in April, but the date was extended till July and later to October. Meanwhile, Abia, Ekiti, Enugu, Gombe, Kwara, Nasarawa, Ondo, and Rivers States have submitted their reports. Lagos State, the epicentre of the crisis, has submitted an interim report with a promise that the final one would be turned in later this month. But the worries for some other panels are coming from the reluctance of some states to fund the proceedings.

Despite the National Executive Council directive that the reports be submitted for final deliberations on modalities for implementation, many states are not in a hurry to do so. In some of the states, members were funding proceedings from their pockets. Cross River and Taraba panels are among those reportedly not well funded. In some others, the panels have stopped sitting even though the job is yet to be completed.

Overall, the panels received about 2,500 petitions across the country. Expectedly, the petitions ranged from gross violations of human rights including indiscriminate arrests, illegal detentions, extortion, sexual and gender-based violence to torture and extra-judicial killings. Adeoye Akintunde, a firefighter, was typical of the scale of atrocities by SARS operatives. On 14th June 2020, he was arrested while having a lunch in a canteen at Ayetoro, Ogun State. “I was tortured with iron rods and hammer to the extent that I fainted. Thereafter, they invited a nurse to inject me,” he said. He spent 12 days in detention and granted bail with the sum of N120,000. But Abayomi Adebayo’s mother was not that lucky. She was felled by bullets from the sporadic shootings of SARS operatives in Lagos who claimed to be searching for an internet fraudster.

As the panels are winding down, the issues of remedies, redress and compensations for the injustice and humiliation suffered by the victims are on the table. Indeed, states like Ekiti and few others have started paying compensations for some categories of victims. Lagos State initially budgeted N200 million for the exercise, an amount that would likely be insignificant going by the large-scale breaches of fundamental human rights and abuses so far uncovered by the panel. But many states have rightly stopped disbursing compensations for victims because the federal government is vicariously liable as it sits atop the atrocities: police who are the culprits are its employees.

Beyond the issue of compensation, what transpired last October should be a wake-up call for those in authority to depart from business as usual and begin to address the various issues that were so clearly articulated by the protests. On the specific matter of police reform on which the original protest was premised, the federal government gave certain undertakings. It is hoped that implementing the reports from the states and the much-awaited federal government reform will produce a more citizen-friendly police that are fit for a democratic society.