By Hope O’Rukevbe EGHAGHA

Last week an Assistant Superintendent of Police Nuhu Usman shot one Oghenemine Ogidi in the head in full glare of witnesses. This was state murder of a defenceless citizen. The victim had received a parcel through waybill which contained a gun. People around immediately tied the young man up and invited the police. Nuhu Usman was sent by the DPO to bring in the suspect to the police station. But things took a disastrous and tragic turn when this renegade officer arrived on the scene. Against reason and any logic, he shot the accused in the head. He did not shoot to disable. He did not shoot at his legs. He targeted the head. His intention was clear. He wanted the young man dead.  

The action of the officer suggests that killing suspects is routine to him. But this time, in the words of Chinua Achebe, he took enough for the owner to notice. Why was the young man compelled to open the parcel for everyone to see? What made Nuhu assume that he would be applauded for killing a young man for being accused of receiving a gun? Why did he think he would get away with the bloody crime? Is the incident not indicative of a practice that is practiced by men and officers of the Nigeria Police? How many police officers who dispatched someone to the other world have been punished in the past? Is there any deliberate effort in the Nigeria Police to educate their men that extrajudicial killings are an offence in the land? 

In our chequered history, there have been cases of police brutality and outright execution of innocent citizens. Dele Udoh was a Nigerian sprinter based in the US who came home in 1981 for the World Athletics Championships. At a checkpoint in Ojuelegba, a trigger-happy policeman shot Dele to death. It was a national scandal with an international implication. In 2015, Comfort Udoh a mother of four was shot dead at Ijegun by Iremu Musiliu. Her husband was shot in the jaw. Kolade Johnson  was shot dead in 2019 while watching a football match at Mangoro. The killers were men of the notorious SARS. Tina Ezekwe was shot by policemen in 2020 during COVID 19. Others include Jimoh Isiaq (2020), Kazeem Tyamiyu (2020), Rinji Bala (2020) and many more. What about the Apo Six? These were traders killed by the DPO and some officers in the Federal Capital Territory. In the Lekki Toll gate incident in October 2020, an unconfirmed number of persons were killed. 

So, killing innocent citizens has been a recurring decimal in the equation of police operations in Nigeria. Poorly trained men act with impunity in the name of the law. Indeed, some of them are criminals in behaviour. Although they are expected to enforce the law, they do not have respect for the law. Which is a fatal irony!  

The problem is deeper than what it seems. Behind the mentality of wasting lives through extra judicial killings, is a contempt for the Nigerian people. Added to this is a feeling of power of the average policeman. When they carry the gun, they automatically become lords. Parents often warn their wards not to argue with an armed police officer, even if the law was on their side. But that power is ephemeral. It is an illusion. Especially if the law catches up with the culprit assassin police officer. 

Every policeman in Nigeria is a potential state assassin. A state assassin without the backing of the state. But such killings are carried out under the cover of state apparatus. Indeed, the temerity to ‘waste’ a life arises from the mere fact that they are officers of the law. ‘If I waste you’, they are known to say, ‘nothing will happen!   

Policemen themselves lack a sense of self-worth. They are victims themselves though they hardly realise it. I often watch policemen deal harshly with Okada riders and students, that is, the vulnerable in society. Any encounter with the so-called ‘yahoo boys’ is an opportunity for extortion. When they go after youths who appear affluent it is not because they want to enforce the law, it is because of their personal gain. How can real policing take place?

We need reforms in policing. First is to redefine police culture in the country. They must be properly trained to know that citizens’ rights must be respected. Training and re-training is essential. Then, we should create different tiers of policing the country. This single command structure is an aberration. Let states have their police force. We want to see different degrees of competence of the men who police the country. The command will be able to train their men in terms of civil obligations.    

All over the world, policemen have been known to abuse power. Perhaps there is a spirit that takes possession of men once they carry a weapon. Meta AI says that police ‘abuse of citizens’ rights is a global issue’. It looks different in each country, but the core patterns repeat everywhere. From excessive force – beatings, shootings, tasers, chokeholds, extrajudicial killings, arbitrary arrests, planted evidence, torture and coercion, extortion and bribery, profiling, and suppression of protests. 

In some jurisdictions, infractions are swiftly punished when they come to light. This is what makes the difference. When the other institutions in the chain do their work effectively, there will be discipline. 

Let ASP Nuhu ‘Ogbegbe’ face the music. He has been particularly notorious. A video clip is currently in circulation in which a Member of House presented a petition against the same officer while he was serving in Kwale area of the state. He was transferred from that part of the state. But his excesses did not stop. Who has been protecting him? Who allowed him to carry the kind of haircut and beard that he has? How many Nuhus are out there currently? How many are potential Nuhus? 

There should be a mechanism in the police that alerts the system about rogue policemen. If we punish Nuhu and allow a culture of impunity to thrive in the Police, we would only be scratching the surface. I sympathise with the family of Oghenemine, the victim of the latest police brutality. 

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