Police Assault: Nigerians report 498 cases of officers’ misconduct in 3 months
The Nigeria Police Force says it has received no lesser than 498 cases of professional misconduct against its officers from the general public in the past three months.
According to the Head of Public Complaints Rapid Response Unit, NPF, Abayomi Shogunle, the figure only accounts for the months of January – March 2017.
He, however, said the figure signified a 52.8 per cent decrease in such cases as opposed to a total of 1,054 cases recorded in the first quarter of 2016.
Shogunle further said that 355 cases out of the 498 were resolved by the police.
65 of the reported cases, according to the spokesperson, were discovered to be false. 78 cases were still pending.
He also said that more than 10,000 phone calls were placed across to the unit from the public during the period. Only 362 calls were processed.
Also, 75 WhatsApp messages, 29 emails, 12 tweets, seven SMS texts, four Facebook posts and nine hard-copy letters and media publications were received during the period under review.
Shogunle said reports of police officers’ misconduct were mostly in Lagos, as a total of 90 cases were recorded.
FCT Abuja and Rivers follow closely with 69 and 59 respectively.
There were no cases against officers in Kwara and Ekiti states, while Sokoto, Kebbi, Jigawa, Cross River and Bauchi commands recorded one case each.
Shogunle further said in his report that the unit recovered a sum of N560,000 from the police in Nyanya Division, Abuja in March. The matter had been reported to the unit in 2015.
He said the Kebbi Command recorded its first case since the inception of the unit in 2015.
