POLICE HIERARCHY AND ITS ROGUE SQUAD

Kyari’s drug case indicates the need for a purge of the police hierarchy, writes Bolaji Adebiyi

The news broke in the morning of the day lovers wore red apparel to celebrate lovers’ day. Media-acclaimed super cop, Abba Kyari, a deputy commissioner of police, had been declared wanted by the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency for allegedly dealing in hard drugs. Red hot news on a red day you would say. But why would one law enforcement agency declare a senior officer of a sister agency wanted? Could the offending officer’s agency not have been contacted to simply hand him over?

The unfolding story of Kyari is a loud testament to the rising impunity in high places and how plain rogues who are no more than common criminals are protected by the hierarchy of security and political authorities. The media-loving and social media buff officer had been a subject of the drug law enforcement agency investigation for weeks. When the agency felt it had enough evidence, it closed in on him.

Penultimate Wednesday, the leadership of the NDLEA turned in their preliminary findings on Kyari and asked the Police authorities to hand him in. When this did not happen, a meeting was held on Thursday with Usman Baba, the inspector-general of Police, who promised to hand him over. In spite of the intervention of the presidency, for three days, this did not happen, forcing the drug law enforcement agency to go public on Monday.

Obviously embarrassed by the NDLEA spill, the Police hierarchy turned in Kyari and his collaborators but not without a drama, which further revealed the decadence in the system. It said its officers were not alone in the despicable act and that the NDLEA must pursue its own rogue officers with the same zeal it had chased the police outlaws. A case of tit-for-tat. The drug law enforcement agency had since replied that it had no rogue officers in its fold to pursue, insisting that Kyari was the principal hard drug dealer with links to the barons in faraway Brazil and Ethiopia.

While the outcome of the unfolding drama is awaited, it is important to note the extent to which the hierarchy of a security apparatchik would go to protect one of its own even in the face of obvious infraction of the very law they are established to enforce. Is it a case of protection of institutional integrity or an attempt to cover up the dirt in the system? Clearly, the latter seems to be the case.

This is not the first time the Police authority would attempt to shield Kyari. Appointed head of Force Headquarters’ Intelligence Response Team, he was briefly effective in bursting kidnap and other sundry crime cases. Soon there were loud complaints about his excesses, including conversion of exhibits and large-scale human rights abuses. Perhaps due to his hype by a section of the media, the Police authorities did next to nothing about these complaints until sometime last year when the US Federal Bureau of Investigation ran rings around him.

Indicted by the FBI for advanced fee fraud the Police dithered until it was forced by the Police Service Commission to institute an investigation into the foreign agency’s allegations. The outcome of the investigation was found watery by the PSC that ordered another investigation by a fresh panel. Yet, despite the damning findings of the second panel its recommendation pending PSC’s consideration before the NDLEA bombshell was a mere one step demotion from DCP to assistant commissioner of Police. Just a slap on the wrist? How do you punish an FBI indictment of dealing with a convicted internet fraudster with demotion?

This was the brewing confrontation between the PSC and the Police management before the NDLEA came up with the drug case. Although, how these will end remains to be seen, a clear case has been made for a thorough reform and purge of the Police hierarchy that has shown so much tolerance of roguery under its watch. Despite the revolt of the youth against its rogue squad, Special Anti-Robbery Squad, in October 2020 culminating in the Lekki Tollgate debacle, stories of police brutality have persisted with its hierarchy doing virtually nothing about it. Scruffy mufti-wearing policemen still intercept young men on the highways in broad daylight, search their phones and extort them with impunity.

The instant Police-NDLEA face-off over Kyari demands an independent inquiry that should unravel the reason for the growing tendency to shield rogue security agents. It should be a catalyst for the purge of the police hierarchy that has been permissive of the infraction of the law by its officers. And one matter that has to be settled without further delay is the persistent tension between the PSC and the Police management.

For some time now the Police management has tango with the commission, particularly over recruitment. Even when the court decided the matter in favour of the commission the Police authority has remained intransigent. Yet, the 1999 Constitution as altered in Section 30 (a) & (b) of Part 1 of the Third Schedule, is clear on the role of the commission as the authority in charge of recruitment and discipline of officers and men below the rank of inspector-general. Perhaps because operational control is in the hands of the inspector-general who is under the command of the president and out of the control of the commission, Police bosses have been emboldened to be insubordinate to the PSC.

In this season of constitution amendment, it may well be an opportunity to review this contention and determine if the inspector-general should not come under the control of the PSC. For it would appear that most Police chiefs have tended to undermine the authority of the PSC simply because they report directly to the president. The rising blatant roguery in the force requires extensive reforms and a massive purge, which a weak PSC cannot do. It, therefore, needs to be strengthened to be able to instil the much-needed discipline in the top and bottom of the force.

Adebiyi, the managing editor of THISDAY Newspapers, writes from bolaji.adebiyi@thisdaylive.com