The All Progressives Congress (APC) has urged the newly-appointed
Acting Inspector-General of Police, Mr. Solomon Arase, to approach his
new task with a high level of professionalism while shunning the kind
of crass partisanship that has dragged key national institutions of
state, especially the police, into the partisan fray.
In a statement issued in Abuja on Thursday by its National Publicity
Secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, the party advised the Acting IGP to
learn from the fate that befell his predecessors who, under their
watch, turned the police into the enforcement arm of the ruling party,
thus allowing the institution to be wantonly used to thwart the will
of the people and act in ways that negate its constitutional mandate
of maintaining law and order.
It said irrespective of the reasons for his appointment as the Acting
IGP at this time, Mr. Arase must realize that he will be judged solely
by the direction to which he takes the police, which is one of the
most abused national institutions by those who have been at the helms
of the nation’s affairs since the country’s return to democratic rule
in 1999.
”We do not know the reason for the sack of the immediate past IGP,
but we have read, just like other Nigerians, that it might not be
unconnected with the role he either played or did not play in the last
general elections. What we do know is that the police force under the
former IG was a major actor in the massive rigging and violence that
characterized the elections in some parts of the country, especially
in Rivers ,Akwa Ibom Sokoto and Gombe states just to mention a few.
”Now, Mr. Arase faces perhaps the biggest test in his new capacity
with the supplementary elections coming up in Abia, Imo and Taraba. We
do hope he will not allow the police under him to be used to thwart
the will of the people in those states or to give cover to those who
will engage in violence. Any IG worth his salt does not need to pander
to the President or the ruling party in carrying out his duties. All
he has to do is to make sure the police carries out its statutory
duties in accordance with the law and without fear or favour,” APC said.
The party said it does not believe the rumours making the rounds that
the new Acting IGP was appointed to facilitate victory for the PDP in
those supplementary elections, saying, in any case, that whatever may
be the reason for his appointment, he should realize that Nigerians
have now reached a level where they will not allow anyone, whether in
uniform or not, to either prevent them from exercising their franchise
or to collude with politicians to ensure that their votes do not
count.
”When Mr. Arase’s predecessor issued an illegal order directing
Nigerians to vote and immediately vacate polling units during the last
elections, he knew he was acting against what the law stipulates, but
he chose to do so anyway to please his masters. However, armed with
the position of the law, Nigerians simply ignored the illegal order,
voted and stayed behind to defend their votes.
”When that unlawful order is placed side-by-side with other acts that
ran contrary to the maintenance of law and order under the immediate
past IG – including the cover given to the OPC to wreak havoc in
Lagos, the illegal withdrawal of the security details of House of
Representatives’ Speaker Aminu Tambuwal, whom he (former IG) refused
to recognize as Speaker in a clear usurpation of the role of the
judiciary, and the shameful role of the police in the Osun
Governorship election last year, during which hundreds of APC members
were arrested and detained without cause – one will realize to what
extent the police was dragged into partisan politics under him.
”But in the end, those for whom the IG desecrated the police had no
qualms about humiliating him out of office. We hope Mr. Arase will
learn a lesson from this, toe a different path and not run the police
like his private company and a tool in the hands of unscrupulous
politicians,” it said.
