Youth and Students Advocates for Development Initiative (YSAD), a civil society and advocacy group, has commended the recent directive by the president that salaries of police officers be reviewed upwards of 20 per cent.
This, going forward, the group believes will better the means and living standard of officers and men in service.
YSAD, aware of this development, which followed the virtual Federal Executive Council, (FEC) meeting, held Wednesday, December 15, 2021 and chaired by the president, whereupon the Minister of Police Affairs, Maigari Dingyadi briefed journalists, -calls on the federal government to ensure speedy implementation of the directive across the board, unlike previous initiatives that never saw the light of the day.
It should be recalled that police welfare was one of the five-point demand of EndSARS protesters last October (2020), and since the police affairs minister himself hinted at this development, YSAD urges the federal government to go one better this time and ensure that all other outstanding demands of the protesters are looked into.
This latest directive, the group assures, falls in line with its recent project themed ‘No Dey Give, Follow the Rule’, an ongoing multi-stakeholder project, which aims at ending all forms of extortion and brutalization of road users, by uniformed personnel deployed to the roads.
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The group in a statement, signed by Obinna Nwagbara, its chief executive officer, noted that If the police is properly funded and equipped that the issue of bribery and brutalization of motorists and other road users, will drastically reduce.
YSAD wants to see logistic and operational support of the police upped beyond the current state of affairs.
“Intelligence gadgets, equipment and uniforms, logistics, training and retraining, insurance policy cover and more should be in the package.
“These will make investigation and tracking of robbers and muggers easier and policing more efficient, as confidence, morale and motivation of men and officers within all ranks will scale up”, the group further said.
While it sounds interesting that the federal government, according to police affairs minister, is releasing ₦13.1billion as death benefits to 5,472 personnel to cover the uninsured period of 2013-2020, YSAD demands accountability and transparency in the management of the fund on the part of police authorities.
This is as YSAD demands financial probity in the disbursement of ₦1.12billiion outstanding benefits covering the period from 2013-2020; stressing that these funds must trickle down vertically, to the persons and personnel for whom they are made.
According to them, “There is every need for a robust police within the federation and every part thereof, as current security architecture of the day, keeps witnessing visible threat and decline.
“There is also every need to ensure financial and moral uplift of men in service, especially such that makes them diligently do their work without having to take out their anger on the civil populace whom they are, as custodians of arms, by law supposed to protect.
They continued, “The police deserve better, they should also get same as underfunding does not only make them susceptible to bribe taking, but to ‘protest against the larger community through extortion”.
As a group bent on ensuring operational welfare of the police, YSAD called on the Auditor-General and the Minister of Finance, to harmonise all grey areas, like computation and reconciliation, so that the enforcement of this directive does not bring about budgetary constraint and shortfall or go against procurement processes and laws.
