By Damuel Itsede
The Police Service Commission (PSC) has called on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to as a matter of urgency and national security, relieve the Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Kayode Egbetokun of his appointment in order to prevent the system from destruction.
The PSC pointedly accused IGP Egbetokun of working deliberately to undermine the police recruitment process as well as interfering with the functions and responsibilities of the commission.
The commission particularly faulted the allegations of corruption levelled against it by the Nigeria police under the supervision of IGP Egbetokun.
Forefront News reported that the Nigeria Police last week rejected the list of 10, 000 new recruits by the PSC describing the intakes as a bunch of untrainable individuals fraudulently recruited by the commission without passing through the recruitment exercises.
But, the Joint Union Congress of the Police Service Commission, has vehemently denied the position of the Nigeria police and urged President Tinubu to as a matter of necessity remove IGP Egbetokun over his alleged meddlesomeness in the recent recruitment of police constables.
Chairman of the Association of Senior Civil Servant of Nigeria (ASCSN) and Joint Union Congress of the Police Service Commission (PSC), Adoyi Adoyi at a press conference in Abuja on Wednesday, June 19, 2024, described the IGP Egbetokun’s allegation as totally false.
Adoyi said that some top officers within the Nigerian Police Force, tried to smuggle 1,000 names during the recruitment process, stressing that the reaction of the Nigeria police was diversionary and a ploy to cover up its inadequacies to ytrain recruits.
The PSC Union members that sang protest songs, said that IGP Egbetokun only moved to prevent President Tinubu from noticing the unpreparedness and inability of the Nigeria Police Training schools across the country to handle the training of the recruits as a result of the sorry states of the facilities.
Adoyi explained that the controversy was deliberately created after the PSC released the list of 10,000 names of successful candidates employed from the recent recruitment exercise it conducted last week Thursday.
Adoyi noted that curiously, a day after the recruitment list was released, the President relieved the PSC Chairman Dr Solomon Arase from his position, adding that on Saturday after Arase was relieved of his position, the Nigeria police issued a statement objecting to the list.
The Force Public Relations Officer, ACP Olumuyiwa Adejobi, in a statement last week, said the police is raising alarm over irregularities and alleged corruption of the recently released names of successful candidates, adding that its objection became necessary following series of complaints and allegations of corruption raised by unsuspecting candidates and stakeholders on the irregularities that marred the exercise most especially the disappearance of the names of screened candidates who were successful to the last stage.
ACP Adejobi said; “That upon careful scrutiny of the list released on the PSC portal, it was discovered that: i) Several names of persons purported to be names of successful candidates are those who did not even apply and therefore did not take part in the recruitment exercise.
ii) The published list contains several names of candidates who failed either the Computer Based Test (CBT) or the physical screening exercise or both.
iii) There are those who made it to the last stage of the exercise but were disqualified having been found Medically unfit through the standardised medical test but who also made the list of successful candidates as published by the PSC.
vi) Most worrisome is the allegation of financial dealings and corrupt practices leading to the outcome where unqualified and untrainable individuals have been shortlisted
“The Inspector General of Police had on 10th June 2024 written a letter of objection to the list addressed to the Chairman of the Commission, citing the discoveries listed above.
“The reaction of the IGP was without prejudice to the power of the Commission to recruit for the police as ruled by the Supreme Court but this power does not include the power to recruit unqualified and untrained individuals for the police.
“Noting that it is the police that bears the brunt of recruitment of unqualified individuals and not the PSC. The same people who recruited anyhow for the police today will turn round to accuse the police tomorrow of inefficiency when their recruits start messing up.
“The Police therefore has since dissociated itself from the published list and called for a review that will be transparent and credible.
“It will be recalled that the leadership of the Police Service Commission, after the pronouncement of the Supreme Court ruling on the powers of the Commission to recruit for the Police, constituted a Joint Recruitment Board, to be headed by one of the Commissioners of the PSC, with the Deputy Inspector General of Police in charge of Training and Development in the Police Force as its Secretary. But surprisingly, the Board was crippled and never allowed to carry out its mandate, insomuch that even the final list was not consented to by the Board.
“The Nigeria Police Force therefore takes exception to this unpleasant development and calls for a total review of the process with a view to recruiting qualified, competent, trainable and productive hands into the Nigeria Police Force, in line with the vision of His Excellency President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s led administration on police reform.
“The NPF hereby reiterates that we are not unconcerned about the plights and ordeals of prospective recruits, who have been subjected to all forms of rigorous screening exercise, assuring that it is our commitment to ensure that the process is thoroughly reviewed, stands fruitful and successful for the betterment of the Nigeria Police, and by extension the country,” the police high command said.
