Nigeria Partners German Government On Police Reform, As IGP Reaffirms Commitment To Human Right Based Policing

By Frank Oshanugor

The Inspector-General of Police, (IGP) Usman Alkali Baba received a high-level delegation of the German Federal Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Tuesday in  continuation of discussions aimed at creating, designing and running a Reform programme for the Nigeria Police Force.

The programme is with support from the German Government through its Global Security Sector Reform Foundation (GS-F), against the backdrop of the Presidential Reform Plan of President Muhammadu Buhari, through the Nigeria/German Binational Commission’s Agreement on Police Reforms.

In a statement on Tuesday, Force spokesman, Frank Mba said the collaboration was focused on enhancing the capacity of the Nigeria Police Force in thematic areas of training, intelligence gathering, forensic capabilities, information and communication technology, and human rights-based policing to catalyze a result-oriented reform in key sectors of the Nigeria Police structure and bring about a paradigm shift in alignment with global best standards.

The German delegation was led by Mr. Alexandre Callegaro, Deputy Director for West and Central Africa, German Federal Foreign Office and comprised Mr. Sascha Weh, Police Adviser at the German Federal Foreign Office, Mr. Matthias Seeger, a retired Inspector-General, and other retired officers of the German Federal Police attached to German Global Security Sector Reform Foundation (GS-F).

The meeting also had in attendance the Inspector-General of Police, who was represented by the Deputy Inspector-General of Police in charge of the Department of Finance and Administration, DIG Sanusi Lemu, mni and other members of the Force Management Team, senior officers from various departments of the Force, AIG (Dr) Cornelius Kayode Aderanti (Rtd) mni, Senior Special Assistant to the President on General Duties, Mr. Tunji Lardnert Jr., Senior Special Assistant to the President on Strategy and Planning, Dr. Charles Omole, National Security Adviser to the Speaker, House of Representatives amongst others.

The Inspector-General of Police expressed the willingness of the Police leadership to embrace reforms in all sectors of the Nigeria Police. He seized the opportunity to assure Nigerians that his administration is poised to cooperate with the German delegation and other development partners on creating enabling platform for general reforms of the Force to promote professionalism, human-rights-based and effective policing of the country.