CAN AN OUTSIDER REFORM NIGERIAN POLICE?
he Nigerian Police (NP) grew from a few thousand men regiment in pre-independence years to a force of hundreds of thousands men today. They now consist of the mobile force, anti-robbery teams, under-cover criminal investigators, detectives and regular cops. There are now police training colleges scattered across the country. In the colonial up till immediate post independence era the NP grew from accepting a few tubers of yams, bags of gari, a few chickens and absolutely no cash to a current force imbued with incredible culture of bribery and corrupt practices unheard of in the history of Nigeria. Bribes requested and accepted are now in the millions of Naira. Let us forget about the pervasive twenty naira collections at police check points which will also run into millions of Naira when collected from hundreds or thousands of check points across the nation. Let us focus on the bribes received for drugs cases covered up, extra-judicial murders and assassinations covered up and massive
