Former governor of Delta state, Emmanuel Uduaghan has reechoed his state police advocacy which he said would curb the precarious security challenges currently been faced in the country.
Mr. Uduaghan who reechoed his call Monday during Channels Television “Sunrise Daily” program aired in Lagos and monitored by HardReporters Abuja Bureau Chief, noted that a lot of the security challenges facing the country today would have either be very minimal or not exist at all if there was a state police in place over the years.
According to the former governor, he believes that once the state police is put in place the issue of security challenges will be a thing of the past if not totally then to the barest minimal level, allaying the fear that the state governors could use the police against perceived political enemies as well as use them for elections to their advantage.
“There are other security challenges that you don’t need the federal government to be able to deal with it and the only way you can deal with it is by having a force as a governor to control over and you don’t need to refer them to Abuja to obtain permission to be able to do it. And this is why I was advocating for a state police. If we had had a state police over the years, a lot of the security challenges we are having now would have either be very minimal or not there at all.
“But this security challenges got worst because the management challenge is not in full control by the governors. A governor don’t need to oppress people, there are so many ways a governor can oppress you without using the police. Nobody uses the police to oppress anybody. No governor will tell a policeman come to Channels and arrest Chamberlain without you committing any offence. This day of social media, its difficult to say you want to oppress anybody with the police.
“Let me correct the impression, having said there would be no challenge in state police, what I am saying is that before we start it at all, we will look at all the challenges. First of all before you can use the police to oppress people during elections you must have to be popular, if you rig an election and you are not popular of course there will be an uprising, it has happened before. Former President Goodluck Jonathan had all the police, army, air force and the navy, if he had declared himself winner of the last election of course the reactions, even in Lagos the kind of uprising we would have had with all the police till today we wouldn’t have been able to manage the uprising.” Uduaghan said.
Uduaghan who noted that the governors challenging the federal government over issues of security in their respective states were doing so as a result of the federal government’s inability to act fast and rise up to the challenges adding that “If they have their own security outfits, they will deal with the problems they don’t need to wait to call on Abuja” even as he said that a lot of things were wrong with “Our federation, the police, funds sharing, education, primary health care and all that, there are so many issues about this our federation.”
Giving his experience while in office as a governor, Uduaghan explained that “There might not be crisis in some states because of the relationship between the governor and the commissioner of police. When I was a governor in my state, once a new commissioner of police is posted, the first thing he does is to report to me to say he is the new police commissioner, I must strike a relationship with him, on one to one level, he respects you as the governor but if it come to a situation where he requires to take permission on some issues from the IG before acting, he will refer to his IG, he won’t listen to you.
“But I didn’t have that challenge because once they come we strike some kind of relationship, he understands I am the governor and you are the commissioner of police and we have our own different roles to play and we must work together to make sure we have a successful policing of the state. Let me tell you what the commissioners of police do, when there is a state security council meeting, immediately after, they contact their IG and once the IG don’t agree with the governor of course he will ask the Commissioner of police not to carry out what was reached at the state security council meeting.
While saying the funding of the police at the federal level was adequate, Uduaghan also advocated that the state policing should be extended to the local governments and villages which he said does not mean the federal police should be eroded totally but work in synergy to fight insecurity.
