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Ben Dunno, Warri
A prominent Right Activist, Dr. Kehinde Taiga, has commended the Inspector General of Police (IGP) Mohammed Idris, for the prompt response in banning the Federal Special Anti Robbery Squad (SARS) of the police force over series of alleged atrocities being perpetrated across the country.
He however urged the IG to immediately set up a monitoring team to enforce strict compliance by all the state commands, as most police commissioners are beneficiaries of the criminal activities being perpetrated by these disbanded police units even at the Divisional level.
The Activist explained that besides the rots in the FSARS, some Divisional police units are equally involved in series of extortion acts by setting up illegal police teams who moves around in unregistered vehicles and mufti to extort money from members of the public in a desperate effort to meet up the target of the Commissioners of police.
While admitting that there are still some good officers in the force who works in accordance with the law in dealings with the populice, he maintained that there was the need to devise a way to check the excesses of the bad ones who are behind the criminality carried out in the various police Commands.
Applauding the Police boss in a statement made available to newsmen in Warri yesterday, the Activist described the IGP decision as a step in the right direction to redeem the image of the police force which had hitherto been tanished by some criminal elements operating within the FSARS unit.
He stated that by responding to the cries of the populace in banning FSARS operations and other units, the IGP had proven beyond reasonable doubt that he was sensitive to the clamour of the masses to ban FSARS, adding that the decision would not have come at a better time than this.
According to him; “This IGP is a man of his word, i remembered vividly when he was an Assistant Inspector General of Police (AIG) in Benin and he assured me then that if he had the opportunity to take drastic decisions that would help in enhancing professionalism in the force, he would not hesitate”.
“And today, he had proven that with the decision to ban the FSARS operation, following the public outcry against its operatives who not only harasses and intimidates innocent individuals but extorts and sometimes involved in the extra judicial killings of law abiding citizens”.
“On my part, I’ve personally written series of petitions against the activities of FSARS in Delta state while i was the Chairman of CDHR and even shortly when i assumed office as the national Vice President of the same body and in all those cases we have evidences indicting them of rights abuses and extortions”.
“In some of those cases, we have some Police Commissioners who would not condone their excesses and would immediately call them to order and even sanctioned some officers who were culpable in our petitions but we also have some police Commissioner who does not see anything wrong with their abuses”.
“We are however glad today that the IGP had taking the bull by the horn in tackling the excesses of FSARS by banning the outfit and we hope other police departments that deals directly with the public learnt from this in their day to day dealings, he stated.
It would be recalled that besides the ban on FSARS, the IGP has also banned the Special Tactical Squad (STS), Intelligence Response Team (IRT), Anti-Cultism Squad and other Tactical Squads operating at the Federal, Zonal and Command levels, from carrying out routine patrols and other conventional low-risk duties of stop and search, checkpoints, mounting of roadblocks, traffic checks, etc – with immediate effect.
In addition, he directed that no personnel of the Force is authorized to embark on patrols or tactical assignments in mufti. They must always appear in their police uniforms or approved tactical gear.
The IGP’s directives come against the backdrop of findings by the leadership of the Force that a few personnel of the Tactical Squads hide under these guise to perpetrate all forms of illegality, contrary to the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP), Code of Conduct and Rules of Engagement establishing the squads.
He has also directed that the Police Tactical Squads remain a critical component of the Force in confronting prevailing and emerging violent crimes in the country.
He however condemns every act of unprofessionalism, abuse of human rights and high-handedness by some personnel of the Squads.
He has therefore ordered the X-Squad and the Monitoring Unit to embark on immediate and massive nationwide monitoring of activities of Tactical Squads and other police officers on the road.
They are to ensure prompt arrest, investigation and prosecution of all erring police officers who violate these directives and other extant regulations of the Force.
