State governors will be responsible for the salary and upkeep of members of the community police in their respective states, police authorities have said.
Deputy Inspector-General of Police in charge of Research and Planning, Adeleye Oyebade, said this while featuring on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily programme on Tuesday.
Oyebade said the Nigeria Police Force remained one entity but the constables that would be recruited for community policing would be part-time officers.
He said, “They are special constables and they shall be recruited as community policing officers and the process of recruitment shall be guided by Section 49 to 50 of the Nigeria Police Act. So, the special constable is going to be an auxiliary police officer.
“We are expecting them to put in 16 working hours in a week and the remuneration is going to be paid by the state government after we must have trained and retrained and got them deployed to the local government where they have been recruited because they know the culture, the language, the orientation and the topography of the area for them to be able to work with the police at that level.”
The DIG said the recruitment would be based on the state of origin and not the state of residence, adding that anyone applying for the new police jobs would have to return to his or her own local government.
He added that the community policemen would not bear arms but would do more of intelligence gathering and tackling non-violent crimes.
“They are not going to bear arms. When there are issues that need firearm usage, the police will come in and they will go together. Their role is intelligence gathering,” the DIG said.
He said the community policemen would also assist the conventional police.
Oyebade said, “These are community police officers. They are voluntary officers. It is just stipends that will be given to them. I know that when they have been trained, they will be kitted and it will be uniform across the country.
“I don’t see any problem emanating from that because from the recruitment up till the training and deployment, we must have given them all that they need and they will have the powers, the privileges and immunity of police officers and they know that if they do anything contrary, they can be disciplined.”
He also assured that community policing would not be in conflict with other state security initiatives like Amotekun and Hisbah, but would rather complement one another.
“I am going to tell you straight away. By the time the community policing strategy and implementation come fully into operation, everybody will follow suit. Everybody will join us and follow what we are preaching and what we practise,” Oyebade said.