Is the Nigerian Police Force an organized crime unit?

Growing up I thought the Police was supposed to make me feel secure. If you see one in your vicinity you should be happy as that would mean those who could do you harm are cowering in hiding.

Fast forward years later, I can see how extremely naive I was to think that the Nigerian Police’s primary duty was to protect citizens. I’ve realized that the Police has two masters, their superiors and money.

Put money in a Policeman’s hand and you have premium access to his services. Don’t give a policeman money when he requests for it, and you could end up in jail or worse dead.

When I think of policemen nowadays, they remind me of the senior students in my days in boarding school who had unparalleled power. The difference being that instead of being harmed with belt and canes, they are armed with guns and you could end up dead at the slightest attempt to defend your right as a citizen.

Nigerian Police are not known for having the slightest regard for the nation’s laws and they hate the sight of a law-abiding citizen, as that would mean they can’t obtain bribe from you.

I have experienced police officers coming up with false laws, false levies, false allegations all in a bid to extort you. In some situations, you are able to point this out to them without risking death, you’d be ‘lucky’ to have just your whole day wasted. However, there are occasions where your attempt to ‘teach them their job’ might cost you your life or cause you bodily harm.

Are these cases anomalies, or the police force is an organized crime unit?

There are so many similarities between our police force and the criminals terrorizing our communities, and rumor has it that in some occasions they work together.

Where does this issue come from? Is the force employing criminals as police officers? Does the Nigerian police force do background checks before recruiting?

There’s an unconfirmed rumor that their superiors give them a monetary target to attain each day and hence they have to employ every tactic possible to extort civilians, how true is this?

What is it about being a member of the force that makes them lose their humanity? You kill a person because of N50 bribe, how do you sleep at night? Are these people not a member of our community? Don’t they have friends, kids, siblings, parents?

In trying to enforce the lockdown, there have been confirmed reports of the Nigerian police force manhandling citizens and even killing citizens in an effort to enforce lockdown. In what world is this supposed to be okay?

Is there no way to educate these police officers on how to treat the citizens? How strict is the punishment for flouting the law?

Does the government know how serious this issue is? Do they know how many families have been torn to shreds due to police brutality?

What steps are being taken to ensure this stop? We can’t continue like this; the brutality has to be checked.

I want to believe there are good ones among the police force, but I rarely come across them and the general public image of the Nigerian Police force has suffered as a result.

Even if you won’t do it for the citizens, do it for your image, regain the public trust again. All we ask for is to be protected by you, not having to protect ourselves from criminals and the Nigerian Police.

If you've made it to the end of this write-up, What do you think is the root of this problem?