To cut to the chase, there are neither ifs and buts, nor hair-splitting micro-analytical pontifications about it: the most important duty of any government is the security and welfare of its citizens. Section 14 (2) b of the 1999 Nigerian Constitution (as amended) clearly establishes that principle: “the security and welfare of the people shall be the primary purpose of government”.

However, in today’s Nigeria, despite the incontestable gallantry, of the patriotic majority of the armed forces and security services, for whom enormous tribute must be always paid; the extant security architecture, nevertheless, demands an urgent, demonstrably effective, and impactful review. Because, there is scarcely a day one reads the news without some gory detail of some terrorist-linked kidnapping or murder somewhere in the country.

Some analysts have pointed out that Nigeria is dealing with the extant insecurity crisis as best as it can, and that Lebanon, Pakistan, Turkey, South Africa et al, have far worse rates of kidnapping. However, that proposition misses the point on three seminal grounds.

First, Nigeria should not, and must never, evaluate the effectiveness of its security architecture by the standards of those countries with the toughest security challenges. Rather, Nigeria should be aspirational: that is, evaluate its performance by the standards of those countries with consistently low crime rates. It should learn from and adapt their modus operandi to local circumstances, relative to crime prevention; intelligence gathering; inter-agency interoperability; and coordination with prosecuting authorities.

Second, kidnapping is viewed by some analysts in isolation, of the over a decade long ethno-religious terrorism confronting the country. That should not be so, because kidnapping is simply a subset of terrorism within the unique context of Nigeria’s heightened insecurity. Afterall, the Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, characterises terrorism as the use of violent action to accomplish political aims. Applying that definition, Ansaru, Boko Haram, ISWAP and other extremist groups and proxies, who seek to replace Nigeria’s secular constitutional government with a religious theocratic regime are terrorist groups.  

Third, Nigeria’s fight against ethno-religious terrorists, using the age-long command-and-control unitarist policing model, with HQ, in Abuja is patently ineffective. Because, there is absolutely no way in which terrorism, and by extension, serious criminality, can be effectively, efficiently, and nimbly addressed, across Nigeria’s 36 states, and the Federal Capital Territory, with an over-centralised model in Abuja.

The complexity and scale of the ethno-religious terrorism confronting the country demands considered analysis and more importantly, innovative approaches. To put this in some perspective, on February 1, 2024, Oba Segun Aremu-Cole, was shot dead by terrorists, who also abducted his wife and others in Ekiti LGA, Kwara State. In January 2024, terrorists ambushed and killed Oba Ogunsakin and Oba Olatunji, in Ikole precinct, Ekiti State; and killed seven farmers in Gwoza, Borno State. In the same month, terrorists kidnapped five students, three teachers and the bus driver of Apostolic Faith Group of Schools, in Emure-Ekiti.

The Governor of Plateau State, Caleb Mutfwang, announced a curfew on Tuesday, January 23, 2024, following a terrorist incident in which approximately 30 persons were killed in the Kwahaslalek precinct.

Furthermore, London’s Financial Times reports that approximately 160 people were killed on Christmas Eve 2023, by terrorists in coordinated across 20 communities in the Bokkos and Barkin Ladi areas of Plateau State in Central Nigeria. According to Associated Press, no group took responsibility for the heinous attacks, though “blame fell on herders from the Fulani tribe, who have been accused of carrying out such mass killings across the north west and central regions where the decades long conflict over access to land and water, has further worsened the sectarian division between Christians and Muslims in Africa’s most populous nation.” These attacks prompted the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Volker Turk, to call for the Nigerian authorities to “conduct, prompt, thorough and independent investigations into the attacks…”
 
In two separate Boko Haram terrorist attacks in October 2023, within the Gurokeyaya precinct, of Yobe State, 37 people were killed and a further seven persons were injured. In August 2023, no less than 36 personnel of the Nigerian armed forces were killed by terrorists within the Zungeru-Tegina and Shiroro axis of Niger State, central Nigeria. Amnesty International further confirms that between June 9 and 11, 2023, 59 persons were killed in the Katarko, Kusherki regions of North Central Nigeria, in terrorist attacks.

Throughout May 2023, at least 100 people were killed in various communities of Benue State. Between May 15-17, 2023, more than 100 people were killed in the Mangu region of Plateau State. And in southern Kaduna, over 100 people were killed by gunmen between December 2022 and April 2023. Back on Pentecost Sunday, June 5, 2022, one of Christianity’s holiest days, St. Francis Xavier Catholic Church, Owo, Ondo State, Nigeria, was attacked by terrorists. The heinous assault resulted in the deaths and injury of more than 50 persons, including young children. In December 2020, the Olufon of Ifon, Ondo State. Oba Adegoke Adeusi was abducted and brutally murdered by ethno-religious terrorists following a meeting of Ondo State Obas, in Akure.

These heinous facts, which are by no means isolated incidents, inherently, speak to the need for an alternative approach to the country’s security architecture. Hence, the case for well-resourced devolved policing at state levels. It works in other countries with much lower crime rates than Nigeria (65.80 crimes per 100,000 people), like Sweden (48.10 crimes per 100,000 people) and Switzerland (24.90 per 100,000 people).

In the UK for example, policing is operationally and financially devolved across 43 territorial police forces in England and Wales, Police Scotland and the Police Service of Northern Ireland. There is robust strategic collaboration amongst all these devolved policing authorities and the British Transport Police, which oversees the safety of the rail network nationwide. Plus, the National Police Chiefs’ Council (formerly known as the Association of Chief Police Officers) is an interoperable organisation which facilitates collaboration across all the independent police units across the country.

As regards accountability, the policing units are subject to parliamentary scrutiny and independent assurance. The philosophical rationale for the devolution of policing powers in the UK is not far-fetched; a police constable in Surrey (England) say, cannot know the intricacies of criminality, criminal gangs, and actionable intelligence on both, in Dunfermline (Scotland), better than a police constable at the latter who has lived there (Dunfermline) all his life!

Police devolution models are equally evident in Australia, relative to the New South Wales Police Force, Northern Territory Police, Queensland Police Service, South Australian Police, Tasmania Police, the Victoria Police and the Western Australian Police. Strategic coordination is accomplished with the Australian federal police, which exercises jurisdiction on federal crimes. Likewise, in the United States, the Mayor of New York appoints the New York Police Department’s PoliceCommissioner. Similar devolved policing models apply in Arkansas, Delaware, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania and Texas.

For clarity, nothing in the foregoing implies that state police, is a panacea for all terrorism in Nigeria. No! However, the statistics on devolved policing are interesting. According to the 2024 World Population Review crime index survey, the countries analysed in this treatise with devolved policing models viz: Australia, recorded 46.70 crimes per 100,000 people; United Kingdom, recorded 46.90 crimes per 100,000 people; the United States recorded 49.20 crimes per 100,000 people. And Nigeria, with a centralised command-and-control policing model recorded 65.80 crimes per 100,000 people. 

Thus, the average crime rate per of 47.6 crimes per 100,000 people in Australia, UK and USA surfaces a statistically significant positive variance of 18.2 crimes per 100,000 people in Nigeria. In short, upon the limited statistical analysis here, there is no basis for a centralised policing model in Nigeria!

Now, here’s the rub. The average citizen in Borno, Edo, Kano, Kwara, Ogun, Plateau states, et al, cares little about confidence intervals, probability densities, regression analysis, standard deviation and other germane statistical terms. They simply want to travel safely to and from their farms, workplaces, schools, churches, mosques, market places like other people do: they just wish to live freely and which is not too much to ask. They therefore entrust decisions pertaining to their safety and welfare to their leaders; a social contract of sorts.

The onus is therefore on their leaders, constitutionally, morally and rationally to do their utmost to guarantee the safety and welfare of Nigerian citizens. Neither mere words, nor business-as-usual complacency, will suffice. Action! Demonstrable action! Urgent action! That is, one characterised by the consistent safety and welfare of the people which, concurrently, captures their confidence and support!

Summing up therefore, the case for a devolved policing model in Nigeria is long overdue. The existing centralist policing architecture, is no longer feasible given the burning volatilities, enormous insecurity and terrorism besieging the country. If police devolution works well, albeit imperfectly, in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States of America, surely the same model, with reasonable adaptations, can work in Nigeria within the right constitutional safeguards and imaginative thinking, if indeed the overriding objective is the security and welfare of Nigerians in their own country.

As a function of innate of civic responsibility, proactive citizens would, presumably, be more than willing to pool resources to support the government within their own, and other states, to support state policing, if the purposive aim is to sustainably safeguard human lives and property. A loss of life to terrorism and insecurity is a loss too many!

Ojumu is the Principal Partner at Balliol Myers LP, a firm of legal practitioners and strategy consultants in Lagos, Nigeria, and the author of The Dynamic Intersections of Economics, Foreign Relations, Jurisprudence and National Development.