FROM: Dappa Maharajah.
THE Chairman of Association of Retired Police of Nigeria (ARPON), Ondo State chapter, Barr. Samuel Adetuyi, has tasked the National Assembly to review its stance on the Nigeria Police Development Fund (NPDF) bill.
He said this yesterday in Akure when reacting to a recent comment of “the Deputy Senate President, Ike Ekweremadu on NPDF, announcing with glee that all money that comes must go into the consolidated fund.”
But Adetuyi argued that it is “a procedural matter, the nitty-gritty of how funding will be managed. That is not what is sent to the National Assembly to approve, what is sent to the National Assembly for approval is the basic method of sourcing for these funds.
Meanwhile the NPDF bill is to provide a legal framework for the management and control of a development fund set aside for the Nigeria Police Force (NPF); and for training and purchase of technological equipment.
Aside the contrary stance of the Deputy Senate President, he lamented that “that Bill was sent to the National Assembly in 2008. This is 2017, almost 10 years and the bill is still a bill.”
He faulted Ekweremadu on the stance that there was no way the money could be collected and handed over to the police, declaring that the Senate leader had over simplified the issue.
According to him, “Nobody is saying that if the bill is approved, the money that is collected will just be handed over to the Inspector General of Police for them to use in purchasing the necessary logistics.
“No, of course, the money would go into the consolidated fund and the money will be appropriated just like all other needs of the police. It will go through the normal budgeting and then it would be appropriated.”
Adetuyi, who is a retired Commissioner for Police and recently launched his autobiography titled: “Policing in Nigeria: My Story,” to canvass for police reform, said the NPDF would allot a particular amount of money for the police in the budget.
He explained that “it is not that the money will be given in cash and they carry Ghana-must-go bag to take the money. It can’t be done; just like the money collected by customs. The money is not spent as it is collected, it goes into the consolidated fund.
“And it is from there the appropriation is made. So that when the police is coming with their budget, they will have at the back of their mind that funds of so so amount will be available based on what had been contributed.”
The ARPON chairman disclosed that despite the huge infrastructural decay, structural defects in operation, poor technology and acute shortage of funds, the police still work to keep the society free of crime daily.
He decried the infrastructural defects in his former place of assignments, as Commissioner in Yobe and Kogi states that were created in 1991, lamenting that the state police commands are still operating from their temporary sites.
Adetuyi, who warned that Nigerians would pay dearly for the criminal neglects of the police if urgent steps are not taken promptly, urged government and policy makers to prioritize police reform for better performance and efficiency.
“I am using this opportunity to appeal that the bill should be looked at again so that we will have a source of ready fund to enhance policing in Nigeria,” he said.
—
Akingboye Joseph Oluwaseun
