By Josef Omorotionmwan
POLICING the police is like engineering the engineer, which appears different from engineering his engine. Some have argued, though, that biomedical engineering may not differ qualitatively from toilet training, education and moral teachings – all of which are forms of the so-called “social engineering”, which in the main, has man as its principal object and used by one generation to mold the next.

In dealing with the police, one is reminded that the pig’s nose is already black and no amount of bleaching can change it. It is like learning to use the left hand at old age. Nothing short of the Tai Solarin therapy would make any impact on the police.

In his younger, more radical days, the late Tai Solarin was asked to prescribe a measure that would introduce some sanity into Lagos. He did not hesitate one bit in recommending that the only way to bring some sanity into Lagos would be to go into an airplane and bomb down the entire city. Then you can re-arrange the place.

Inspectors General of Police come and go. Undoubtedly, we are interested in their beginning but we are more interested in the way they end. This inaugural sermonisation by every new Inspector General of Police has virtually become a permanent feature. We have had enough of these tough talks at inauguration, which do not synchronize with facts that emerge later.

Up till now, IGP Tafa Baogun’s inaugural speech laced around his “zero tolerance for corruption” has remained the most impressive. His speech put us on such a high plane of expectation that we are up till now unable to reconcile his promises with the fact that he ended up probably out-looting strongman Abacha.

He was virtually richer than the Federal Government, while he left the Nigeria Police Force more pathetic and more corrupt than he met it.

We are thoroughly convinced that the Acting Inspector General of Police, Mohammed Abubakar, understands our feeling, hence he warned early enough in his speech: “You may have heard this rhetoric at the inception of every new police administration but I must tell you that this time, we mean to drive our vision to a logical conclusion…”.

He also perfectly understands the type of liability that he is inheriting as a police force. Hear him: “The Nigeria Police Force has fallen to its lowest level and has indeed become a subject of ridicule within the law enforcement community and among members of the enlarged public.

Police duties have become commercialised and provided at the whims and caprices of the highest bidder… Complainants suddenly become suspects at different investigation levels following spurious petitions filed with the connivance of police officers. Our police stations have become business centres and collection points…”.

Nigeria does not still have what could be called a police system. Otherwise every new police chief would not be coming to Louis Edet as one coming from outer space to administer a personal estate that has just been built. The ultimate end of policing is the security of life and property. But if a police chief must spend his tenure only laundering the image of the Force, or, as it were, trying to resurrect a dead Force, then, there is cause to worry.

With a system in place, the duty of a new police chief is to come in and administer the Force along given lines and laid down procedure and not to form a new Force and begin to enunciate the theories on which the Force will operate as if he was not an integral part of the outgoing administration.

Expectedly, Abubakar is already following the foot steps of his forerunners. Must an incoming police chief always dismantle the road-blocks as soon as he arrives, only to re-instate same a few weeks later, when the bubble begins to burst? We get the impression that this is one thing they have picked up from the petroleum sector.

During the Olusegun Obasanjo years, each time they wanted to introduce a price increase, they created scarcity so that Nigerians willingly accepted any increase they introduced.

Similarly, the road-block is so dear to the heart of every police boss that his initial reaction is to attack it and induce the necessary artificial scarcity so that as echoes of crime increase begin to emerge from every part of the country, he quickly re-instates the roadblock.

This time around, he infuses his own men into the system. Meanwhile, all we hear is the cock and bull story that the roadblock is being dismantled because it has been turned to a toll-gate. Yes, the cops at the roadblocks are collecting N20. Too bad! Are they alone? What of the ones on the front desk? What of those on investigation and the rest? You may as well dissolve the entire Police Force because every part is as rotten as the other. But, is that not the discipline we are talking about? Whose fault is it that you are unable to discipline your subordinates? Must you take it out on the citizenry? Haba!

Listening to the new sermon at Louis Edet, we heard nothing new. However, if a man tells you that “he looks forward to a Police Force peopled by respectable officers and men, dignified by the selfless service they offer, respected by the public they serve and deserving of their wages…” it is only fair to listen to him and wish him the very best, even where he has not issued any blue-print on how he hopes to attain the enviable goals he has set for himself. Shall we return to Tai Solarin?