By
’Tunji Ajibade
The new Inspector General of Police, Mr Kayode Egbetokun, was elevated and he promptly said he felt like a tiger and a lion at the same time. He said by this he meant he was ready to take action against criminals. He’s obviously looking outward. The challenge is that if he doesn’t look inward that aim can’t be achieved. First, he should roar at officers who have a tendency to pretend they are unaware of orders so that they can hear. The phenomenon of police officers doing what is contrary to rules and the orders expressly issued by their superiors cannot be what the new IGP is unaware of. So it’s where he should start.
The basis for this view was the last public comment that Egbetokun’s predecessor, Usman Alkali Baba, made. At a meeting with senior police officers earlier in June, Baba condemned the practice of “criminalising civil matters by police officers.” He said “I have maintained a stand and rolled out several directives and correspondences…on the need to streamline our investigations and caution officers and men against meddling with civil matters such as land cases, debt collection, matrimonial case and matters already pending in court. It is the same reason why I forbid transferring of cases from lower commands to higher ones indiscriminately.”
However, citizens had several instances where police officers ignored Baba’s instructions as well as court orders. One of Baba’s instructions warned officers not to arrest people first only to start looking for evidence to prosecute them. This is still happening. Long before ENDSARS protests happened, citizens complained about the activities of police officers that were contrary to their rules of engagement and the publicly stated instructions of police hierarchy. The practices that led to ENDSARS protests are still here. For instance, I once watched a young man hand over his expensive mobile phone to an elderly woman as he approached a police checkpoint. I asked why. He said the police would collect his phone and accuse him of being a scammer. This was more than a year after the ENDSARS protests ended. On a regular basis young people grumbled online that if they held expensive phones police would collect it from them.
As for deliberate flouting of court orders there is one case that has been in the news for some time involving the maker of ALABUKUN pain killer drug, Mr Koye Odulate, and his ex-wife, former Mrs Rihole Odulate. In order to ensure this example is not dismissed as another unsubstantiated claim, I shall reference relevant official documents at some length as already reported in the news. At least these are verifiable. In Suit No. FHC/L/242C/2022, the Monitoring Unit said to belong to the office of the IGP sought an order from court to seize the property of Ms Rihole. A letter dated 22nd of March, 2023, and which showed a signature meant to be that of Honourable Justice D.E. Osiagor had an order of Court to seize two of Ms Rihole’s properties in Lagos State. This happened some six months after an order was issued by a federal high court asking the police to maintain status quo pending the determination of all marital suits involving Ms Rihole and Mr Odulate
In a paper submitted at the Federal High Court, Ikoyi, with Charge Number FHC/L/242C/2022 on May 26, 2023, which challenged the court warrant that enabled police to seize Ms Rihole’s properties, it was alleged by her lawyers that the Nigeria Police consistently breached an existing court order restraining all parties involved in the marital case from taking further action against her. The court order itself in suit number FHC/L/CS/851/2022 was issued on August 25, 2022 by the Honourable Justice Akintayo Aluko who asked the police to maintain status quo ante bellum until the fundamental case was over at Federal High Court, Ikoyi, Lagos.
In spite of this, as lawyers to Ms Rihole alleged, the Monitoring Unit still seized her property. Monitoring Unit also went a step further to obtain papers from the office of Nigeria’s Attorney General and Minister of Justice, coopted the Nigeria Interpol, UK Interpol, and as well as the UK government to initiate steps “to orchestrate the extradition of Ms Rihole” from her base in London to face criminal charges. This is a civil/marital matter, but the Monitoring Unit turned it into a criminal one. Meanwhile, the origin of the charges against the mother of two was that after a UK court ordered her ex-husband to pay for the upkeep of their children, Mr Odulate reported to the Nigeria Police an allegation of fraudulent siphoning of funds from family company (makers of ALABUKUN) in which Ms Rihole was a director and another company that they jointly owned.
In suit number FHC/L/CS/851/2022, lawyers to Ms Rihole said Mr Odulate made what they called “false” allegations because she and Mr Odulate “are presently engaged in divorce proceedings which are aimed at providing financial remedies to the 1st Applicant (Mr Rihole) and the children of the marriage between the 1st Applicant and the 1st Respondent (Mr Odulate) which was dissolved on 14th January 2022.” The lawyers further stated that “These false fraud accusations are attempts by the Respondent (Mr Odulate) to use the Respondents (police officers) to continue to harass (Ms Rihole) on the grounds of these baseless accusations and to destabilize the 1st Applicant’s financial remedies applications on going in the Family Court in the United Kingdom. That the 1st Respondent (Mr Odulate) has bragged and made statements severally of his ability to bribe the 2nd and 6th Respondents (both police officers) and even the Nigerian Judiciary.”
Meanwhile, the DPO where complaints related to the civil/marital case were lodged in Lagos reportedly informed Ms Rihole’s lawyers that his office had nothing to do with the case anymore. He directed them to contact police headquarters, Abuja, on all matters regarding the harassment of Ms Rihole and the seizure of her properties by the police and over which she instituted a case at a federal high court, Ikoyi, Lagos. According to the DPO this was because the Monitoring Unit moved the marital case from Lagos to Abuja, a step contrary to IG’s standing order as quoted earlier.
This case is still ongoing as the mother of two battles in court to regain her property. She is also seeking court reliefs concerning constant police harassment meted to her and her family members some of whom have been picked up by Interpol across the world at one time or the other. This is the extent the police have gone over a civil case. Several letters that the helpless mother of two presented to the office of the IG got no responses. It’s surprising how one man has been able to get the police to go to the extent they’ve gone in this marital case. Of particular interest should be how the police regularly flout basic operational rules as well as orders issued by their superiors and nothing follows it.
It is worth noting that news reports had been coming out about the ALABUKUN case in particular at the time Alkali Baba made the comments he did. Surprisingly, Baba only made the comments but no known step was taken to instruct the Monitoring Unit to return the case involving ALABUKUN back to Lagos. Also, nothing was done to stop the flouting of court order that asked the police to maintain status quo. Is this the manner police hierarchy will continue to handle issues of discipline within the force?
The new IG has promised Nigerians so much with regard to what he plans to do that he cannot allow the same trend to continue. He needs to set up a process that ensures all cases in which rules of engagements have been flouted by officers are reversed. Where cases are taken away from there sources, they should be returned. Where civil matters have been criminalized they should be undone. More than this, the IG should make it mandatory that movement of money in the bank accounts of police officers as well as those of their family members is monitored by the force in order to curb corrupt practices. The IG should start with housecleaning before he embarks on his clean-out campaign against criminals out there.
