A combined photo of Tunji Disu and Jackson Ojo
By Mike Odiakose
An internationally acclaimed Security Expert, Dr Lekan Jackson Ojo, has tasked the Acting Inspector General of Police, Tunji Disu, to make the welfare of Police Personnel his top priority to boost their morale.
In a message to the Ag IGP, Dr Ojo lamented the poor the welfare packages of officers and men of the Nigeria Police Force.
He attributed the corruption within the force to this malaise and the poor logistics to cater for their daily operations.
According to him, the leadership of the NPF does not have moral justification to sanction those that cross the line if what ought to have been provided to the policemen are not forthcoming.
He bemoaned a situation where policemen are practically forced to collect money at checkpoints or harass citizens to raise funds to maintain their operational vehicles and other logistics.
“Most of these policemen you see they are still the ones that pay for logistics. If you see any police patrol van it is the people you see in the van that buys the fuel, take care of the tyres, maintain the vehicles from their own pockets. How do they get the money? Of course, from the road.
“So, for you to eradicate all these the welfare packages of the men of the Nigeria Police should be heavy. Go to Benin Republic, if you offer bribe to a policemen you will be arrested and they will charge you to Court. You think they are doing that with empty stomach? No.
“Number one thing for you to boost the morale of the police, to spur them to action, for discipline to be imbibed to at least minimum of 70 percent, you need to do something. When a police officer is earning almost nothing, he will pay for transport, he will pay rent, he will take care of his family, he will take care of his health and his pension. At the end of the day you see a policemen that served up to the rank of CSP, up to Assistant Commissioner if he has not gotten any juicy command he may not have a car of his own, he may not have a house of his own, he may not be able to train his children. He that is down fears no fall.
“Everything in life is about risk. Somebody that is dying and you go a flash bundles of naira before him and you say because he is born-again he will reject? No.
“The first thing the new Acting Inspector General of Police, Tunji Disu, should do is to change and enhance the welfare packages of the men of the Nigeria Police. By the time you do it you will have the moral justification to deal with anyone that steps out of line.
“You have no money in the wardrobe or somewhere in your house and your children are hungry and they now mistakenly enter your room and see the money and you say they should not take the money? They don’t have liberty to do that but you have no moral justification to punish them. What is wrong is wrong and the first wrong counts most.
“Are they not supposed to be well paid, are they supposed to be buying uniforms and boots for themselves? Are they supposed to be fueling their vehicles, buying tyres and maintaining their vehicles? Is that one not wrong?
“That is why I said he (IGP) should play his own role first as the new father of the Nigeria Police. When he has done that by the time anyone defaults he has the moral justification to deal with that one. People like that you can dismiss them. But when your children are hungry and you keep money and you say they should not go and steal it, is it good for them to starve and die?
They will look at death, they will look at their father’s money, they will go and pick their father’s money.
“If you don’t provide for your children what are you doing? You are training them for criminality.
“Tunji Disu should take the welfare of the Nigeria Police very seriously. Doing that will become a morale booster, it will be spurring them to action. They want to wake up to go the office, they want to go and tackle all these criminalities and crimes. But when a man is leaving his house in the morning and he quickly wants to run out of the house before the children will wake up because they will ask him what are we going to eat and he has no solution and you think he will get to office and do well? No.”
Dr Jackson Ojo also advocated for proper training of policemen.
“After the recruitment of the policemen do they train them, what type of training, is it civil or combative training? Do they change their mentality? Do they educate them on police/public relationship?
If they do all those ones, what are their salaries? ”
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