NEC begins moves to decentralize police operations

The National Economic Council presided over by the Acting President, Yemi Osinbajo, on Thursday commenced the process that may eventually lead to the decentralization of the operations of the Nigerian Police Force as one of the ways to tackle insecurity in the county.

The National Security Adviser, Babagana Monguno, disclosed this to State House correspondents at the end of the council’s meeting held at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

The council which is chaired by Osinbajo has all state governors and relevant ministers as members.

Monguno said the council would set up a committee to achieve its goals of decentralising the police.

He said the Inspector-General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, would head the committee that will have representatives from the six geopolitical zones of the country as members.

“The council (NEC) decided that a committee would be set up with representation from each of the geo-political zone to be chaired the IGP so that we find ways of decentralising police operations so that there will be greater access to information and handling this (security) situation will be easier rather than a centralised and cumbersome approach,” he said.

He said the decision to set up the committee was reached after he, on behalf of the nation’s security agencies, briefed council members on the general overview of the security situation in the country.

He said with the increasingly asymmetric nature of the nation’s security threats, he stressed the need to deal with the problems collectively.

Monguno admitted that the nation’s security challenges cannot be completely tackled within a short period.

He however expressed the belief that collaboration among the tiers of government would go a long way in addressing the challenges.