An advocacy group, Joint Action for Good Governance, JAGG, has urged the National Assembly not to consider creation of state police in the ongoing amendment of the constitution.
The national vice-president of JAGG, Abdulwaheed Odunuga, expressed the view in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria on Sunday in Lagos.
He said the National Assembly should rather concentrate on how to strengthen the capacity of the federal police to deliver the much-expected security.
Mr Odunuga said that if created, state police would be abused and manipulated by state politicians.
He said: “It will be a doom for this country if state police is entrusted to this our present crops of leaders.
“It will be commandeered by ambitious state governors who will convert it into private political weapons, just like the State Independent Electoral Commissions.
“They (state political actors) will abuse the powers of the state police which will further divide the country, terrorise the people they are supposed to protect.”
According to him, the national assembly should make laws to to deepen the strength, capacity, operations and professionalism of the federal police.
NAN reports that the 10th National Assembly has begun the process of amendment of the 1999 Constitution.
The Senate had, in February, constituted a 45-member Constitution Review Committee, headed by the Deputy Senate President, Sen. Jibrin Barau.
Senate President, Godswill Akpabio, while inaugurating members of the committee in Abuja, said the review of the constitution had become imperative “in order to put certain things right”
Recently, House of Representatives also inaugurated its constitutional review committee for the amendment of the 1999 Nigerian constitution as amended.
The Speaker, Tajudeen Abbas, while inaugurating the committee, said that the step marked another significant moment in the democratic journey towards a more ‘perfect union’.
He said that it was expected that the sixth alteration under the tenth National Assembly would be the most comprehensive.
One of the areas listed for possible consideration in the amendment is creation state police to address the current security challenges.
NAN
