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From Paul Osuyi, Asaba
The Police Community Relation Committee (PCRC) said the current strength of the Nigerian Police Force is grossly insufficient to effectively tackle the rising insecurity in the country.
National vice chairman of PCRC (South-South), Kenneth Otuonunyo stated this in Ughelli, Delta State.
He also condemned the recent killing of a police Inspector, Jude Ukoaka attached to the Ughelli Area Command, describing it as senseless and unwarranted.
“Without the police, there is no PCRC, when there is a strong synergy between the police and the PCRC, then crime will be reduced to it’s barest minimum.
“Basically the function of the police is a reflection of the kind of society we have. Every society will reflect what is has inside. One thing people have not realized is that, our population is growing at a geometric progression, while the force is growing at a arithmetic progression. It means the force is already overwhelmed.
“I advocate that they increase the number of manpower of the police force for a proper policing. The police are doing their best and that is why you find out that each time our policemen go outside the shores of Nigeria they are given accolades as the best police officers on earth, but at home they lack right environment to function effectively.
“We often talk of police brutality, but police brutality is a reflection of what the society is melting out to the police. In America, for instance, when a police wants to arrest a criminal, he identifies the criminal, and criminal hands up, put his hands behind his back for the handcuff, but in Nigeria, you’ll find a criminal exchanging fire with the police officer.
“There is no need killing our police officers. No police wants of be used as a scape goat. If you are a policeman, there is every tendency that you will want to use force, knowing fully well that your life is in danger, that is on one side. The other is that, when a policeman losses his life in the line of duty, more often than none, the government does not carter for the family. We have lots of polices’ wives and children that are suffering, abandoned since the very moment their father passed on.
“So you so do not expect the best from a man that is not well cartered for. If you visit our police barracks you have to attest to the fact that our police are poorly treated. In a situation were the policeman will have to buy, his own shoe, his own uniform, you don’t expect to get the maximum from such a person, because psychologically they are demoralized,” he said.
Otuonunyo who is also the National Capacity Building Chairman of Committee, further pointed that his greatest achievement in his first tenure was uniting the PCRC in South South.
He said, “before my emergence the South South PCRC do not have a common goal. It was operating independently in each state but as a National Vice Chairman, I was able to bring the whole of the south south together.
“And you can see today that, all six state Chairmen of Edo, Delta, Bayelsa, Rivers, Akwa Ibom, and Cross Rivers were present. It’s an uncommon feet. Most geopolitical zones cannot gathered their Chairmen together in one place, that is my major achievement. In the entire South South state, there is no state that is a operating caretaker committee, they are all elected officers.”
