By Jimitota Onoyume

PORT HARCOURT—ASSISTANT Inspector- General of Police, AIG, Zone 6, Mr Tunde Ogunsakin, has ordered that members of a special unit of the Police in Rivers State, code named C4I, should no longer be deployed to provide security at political rallies in the state.

Ogunsakin, in a statement, yesterday, also said no officer of the unit should be assigned to provide security for top politicians and other senior citizens otherwise referred to as Very Important Persons, VIPs in the state.

“The C4I Unit should henceforth stop featuring in political campaigns. The C4I Unit of the Department of Operations should, on no account, post their officers to any political appointee or VIP,” he said.

It will be recalled that the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, recently alleged that it had uncovered plans by the All Progressives Congress, APC, in the state to use the C4I to rope in the governorship candidate of the PDP, Mr Nyesom Wike, and President Goodluck Jonathan in a phoney crime.

Ogunsakin, who noted that the C4I dismissed the allegation as untrue, also ordered the Head of the Special Police unit in the state to brief the state Commissioner of Police, Mr Dan Bature, about the operations of the unit daily.

He said: “The zonal command has received serious reports of allegations made against the C4I Unit of the Department of Operations of the Rivers State Police Command. The allegations were hinged on the supposition that the C4I Unit was being used by a political party against members of another political party. The allegations further hold that there were plans to frame some individuals with the connivance of the C4I Unit.

“In response to these, I had a meeting with the Commissioner of Police, Rivers State Police Command and some other senior police officers at the state Police Headquarters, Rivers State. Also at the meeting was the expatriate supervisor of the C4I Unit who denied all the allegations against the outfit.

“It is important to state that the directive that the C4I Unit should not post their officers to any political appointee or guard duty is because of the need to make them concentrate on their conventional roles of crime prevention and detection in the metropolis and other parts of the state.”