Is it only Highways, how about other roads?

If it is a roadblock, it is not acceptable. Wherever they are, once you stand on the road or you hinder free flow of traffic. it is not acceptable. People call me. They send me text messages that your boys are there. So I forward it to the Commissioner of Police. That is why I’m going to appeal to you people, that wherever you are operating, you should have the Commissioner of Police number. The only way you can help is to send a text to the commissioner whenever you witness such a thing. Tell him some guys have constituted themselves as public nuisance on the highway and you forward it to me too if possible. If I give him some reasonable time and he does not take action, I will hold him responsible as breaching of trust.

Can you tell us how you intend to equip the police considering the dwindling economy?

The economic downturn is something that I cannot really speak about. I can always articulate the needs of the police force. I don’t have the resources directly. We have other departments that oversee the NPF directly. The one that infringes on the operational capacity of the NPF is the Ministry of Police Affairs because they keep our money.

You spoke about fighting corruption within the police, how would go about that?

It is very easy. When you talk about equipment, they are those things that touch the lives of a policeman. A policeman is corrupt because he is not very sure of the future. If he thinks that his future is not guaranteed, the tendency for him to be corrupt is very high. Don’t forget too that corruption can be something that is pathological. Once you are corrupt, if I put you where they distribute stationery, you will still steal it. So there are issues like that. So the areas I’m trying to talk about is those areas where we can touch the lives of our policemen, inspectors and the likes. We have the cooperative societies, we have set up a mortgage institution, we have a micro finance bank. In our works department, we have been able to attract the best brains we can get from the system.

These are architects, quantity surveyors, civil engineers. Now, we have an investment department. Why can’t we pull our mortgage institutions and the cooperative and do direct labour stuff? We can build some houses like 2-bedroom apartment for our workforce where they won’t have to pay more than N2.5 million or N3 million. If it is direct labour, to build a bungalow in this country, you need about N5 to N6 million. If you give it to a contractor, maybe the land is police land, they take our money as counterpart funding then they resell the land to us for N18 million to N20 million. Where do you expect a policeman who does not earn well to do it? There are areas where we can touch their lives and we now put some caveats to say if you remain straight, you will be entitled to this. It is a carrot and stick thing. I have been command commissioner. I have worked in various departments.

Sometimes, I have had to rely on my friends out there. The technical platforms I’m talking about, most of my friends set it up for me which ought not to be anyway. I am not unmindful that these boys need tools to work. But with the available resources, we have, we provide those things. The management too, at the strategic level, we should be able to come up with policies that will give them hope that if you remain straight, you are entitled to these things. Now, we also have a scholarship scheme for children of the rank and file. We encourage them that if you are bright, we can give scholarship to two of your children at police secondary school or any other place you want them to go to. The Turkish International School has also given us some support. So, there are some small things you can use to motivate your workforce. I keep saying it, the money is not enough but it is not the least in the society.

So are we seeing an increase in Police salary?

Oh! Well, yes! Even my predecessors and a lot of us have been making cases about it. I have been in this police management close to five years now. We have always been articulating this issue that it is not enough. But, sometimes, when you make comparative studies, you take some African countries that are not as large as Lagos; you now say that the salary of those people is even bigger than ours. Well if you want to go further to situate it within the context of our institutions; you will see that our population is higher and the things we are taking care of are bigger.

Is there any plan to stop a situation in which policemen have become domestic staff or personal bodyguards of politicians and others?

One of my friends told me that what we are doing now is to police the elites; we are not policing the security space. So I have already given directives that, as a stop gap measure, all civil commissioners in all states of the federation should not have more than two policemen.

As for the excess, we are pulling them out to form Judges Protection Section because we think that, with this tribunal cases that are going on, the judges require special protection. We have already given directives on this and I have asked the Commissioners of Police to immediately effect that. More so, a lot of them gave argument that during the electioneering campaigns, they were scared that their opponents were going to do this and that. But now that it is all over, we are going to take a census of how many policemen do we have out there? And we start pruning them. We will first start from the government houses.

What would be your definition of effective policing and what legacy do you intend to leave behind as an IGP?

There are always challenges in every facet of our lives. Let me say this on a philosophical note. I have come a long way. I have dreamt dreams. I have travelled extensively around the world. I have served in the corridors of power. I think I am the only policeman who is living in the police history who has served three Inspectors General of Police for five years as Principal Staff Officer. I have articulated what I think responsible policing should be. I think I have the opportunity, no matter how short, to be able to navigate the NPF on the pathway of responsible policing.

A police force that, when you meet with them, they are confident, proud, intellectually deep, professionally effective, people who can beat their chests and say ‘yes, I am doing a good job.’ I want members of the public to also see me as somebody who is doing a good job and someone who can change the police force. I think I have both the professional and intellectual capacity to do that. Sometime ago, I was discussing with some of my close friends, I said my kids have been out for a very long time. Whenever they come on holiday, I take them to Benin. I want them to connect with their environment but when people talk about issues of kidnapping, cult groups and I start wandering do I have to start caging my kids, protecting them from going to their environment? I want to see an environment where people can feel free and feel comfortable. Even if a crime happens, we have officers who can detect it or when you give information to an officer, you feel like it is information that has been dropped into the ocean or that cannot be shared with someone. I want to see a policeman whose word is his bond.

I want to see a policeman who is neatly dressed and elicits public confidence. I want to see a policeman who, when he speaks, speaks authoritatively about the security space. Those are the policemen I want. In all the officers I have mentored, sometimes, I want to replicate them, I want to see them and say even if I leave tomorrow, that I am leaving some crops of officers who will be able to act as change agents to change the perception of policing in the country. I joined the police force as a civilian. I know I’m going back there again. I should be able to look back after my tenure and say that I have left some indelible mark.

Something stands out in your resume. It is the fact that you hold two Bachelors and two Masters, how did you achieve that?

Well, I read political Science as my first degree in Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria. When I left ABU, my mother, who was a teacher, wanted me to be a diplomat. When I did not become a diplomat, she was distressed. She could not understand why her only son ended up in the police. How would she tell her colleagues? I was a graduate already and I told her, ‘no. you don’t understand.’ But she insisted I must go for a Masters, I now promised her that I was going to do a Master’s programme and that when I do the Masters programme, if along the line, she is still not comfortable, I will end up being a journalist or teacher so she was comfortable with that. Immediately, I started thinking. I started doing the Masters programme in political science. But, along the line, I said no, I need a fall back. So, I deviated to law. I now did a first degree in law and did a second degree in law, did Masters in Strategic Studies— in political science.

Actually, I have completed a PhD as my exit gift but I still want to connect to my society in public law. That is why I was able to work with IGPs. Though, I socialize but there is a social content to policing.