The police and Joy Odama saga

By Bala Ibrahim

I read the piece by Emmanuel Onwubiko in his Rights Watch column of Tuesday June 20, 2017 in The Authority newspaper titled ‘Joy Odama: A compromised police’ with a heavy heart. Such a passionate writer! But, mis-informed.

Perhaps the first thing that people need to know about the police force is that it is an institution that has been trained to detach itself from some of the most inhibitive passions of the mind. That is why the institution does not get easily carried away by emotion in the discharge of its duties. Men of the police have seen and will continue to see terrible cases involving fellow humans, some leading to gory sights and others to death. Some have to do with human sufferings while others involve betrayals of differing sorts.

Policemen are human and they get touched by touching issues but they have been trained against getting emotionally involved so that they can dispassionately confront the matter without getting beclouded by wavering minds. Every aspect of their duty, from crime detection, prevention, investigation and prosecution is approached with all the seriousness it deserves, yet with clear mind. This is the way of the police all over the world.

The Nigeria police have come a long way. It is an institution that was created to serve colonial purposes but has transformed with the evolution of Nigeria into a nation-state, getting decimated along the way by successive military governments that have continued to undermine it until it became almost hopelessly ineffective. That was the skeletal institution that the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Ibrahim Idris inherited and promised to remedy. Already, personnel issue is being addressed, proper training is being given, but equipment is still an issue. So also funding. Till date, our policemen don’t get paid as and when due, because of the paucity of fund, and the National Assembly, which was supposed to take a critical peek into the Police Trust Fund Bill and act on it, seems oblivious.

On the issue of Miss Joy Odama, the Nigeria Police Force rose up to the challenge that a crime may have been committed. There was a dead person. At the point when the police came into the matter, the line of action was to determine the possible cause of death. The police have the duty to open their own official investigation at their own instance, under their own watch and arrive at their official conclusion, without fear or favour. The process is however always subject to scrutiny on demand.

Police investigations, as detailed by the Force PRO, CSP Moshood Jimoh, read as follows: 

A. To ascertain the actual cause of death of Joy Odama, two autopsy examinations were carried out. The first autopsy examination conducted by a pathologist, Dr. Jibrin Paul with National Hospital Abuja, was released to the police on the 10th May 2017, though not conclusive.

B. The second autopsy examination conducted on the corpse of Joy Odama on the  9th June 2017, by another pathologist, Dr. Wilson Akhinwu, was carried out in the presence of the first pathologist Dr. Jibrin Paul and witnessed by a private person, one Augustine Okechukwu of Basic Rights Enlightenment Foundation, at the same venue where the first autopsy was done at National Hospital Abuja and was conclusive.

Both revealed that Miss Onwubike regrettably died out of excessive inhalation of fumes from a power generating set. Meticulous and thorough inquiry into the cause of death did not point to the existence of drugs or any narcotic substance in her system, except for carbon monoxide, which was suspected to be from the power generating set. This is the result of police investigation, an investigation that was carried out with all sense of responsibility and transparency. As painful as the death of any citizen is, the police institution, though sympathetic and pained, is only mandated to unravel any possible related crime, not to indict people at all cost.    

Mr. Onwubiko’s standpoint could be understood, since he is coming from a human rights background, but even human rights principles do not agree with indictment of citizens without cause. 

The IGP has said that he looks forward to every bit of information or petition that may lead to the resolution of any crime or criminal activity anywhere in the country.

Human rights writers have a greater duty to make the country less prone to human rights abuses. Beyond engaging in general condemnations, activists around the world have moved ahead to harnessing their intellect to influence government policies. So, we urge our own activists to do same to make our government give us a better police.  A country of close to 200 million people needs a police force of at least 200, 000 men and officers, assuming that a policeman would be assigned to a thousand people?

So far 10, 000 men have been recruited since the coming of IGP Ibrahim Idris, and as they undergo training, it would have been desirable to have the best gadgets in the world to train them with, the same way it would have been helpful to equip them with the best available equipments after training. But how is that possible if the institution is so cash-strapped that it always goes cap-in-hand begging for operational vehicles, choppers and bikes from state government? The problems are numerous and are known to us all. 

For the records, the police institution under IGP Ibrahim Idris does not compromise in its duties; rather it gives all it takes to protect the citizenry, no matter how difficult the situation might be.

Bala Ibrahim wrote from Abuja