IGP Should Be Committed To Prison -Retired Police Officers

The Inspector-General of Police may be the boss of all police officers, but for some of them, the IGP should be committed to prison

They say their demand is based on the fact that the IGP, Usman Alkali Baba is culpable for contempt of court.

The retired police men who made their demand in statement issued by Mr Emmanuel Idris, on behalf of other aggrieved retired officers, and served through their counsel, Mr Godwin Okoro, also joined the Police Service Commission (PSC) and the Force Secretary.

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Establishing grounds for their prayers, the retired police officers declared:

“We are members and graduates of Course 33, 34 and 35 of the Police Academy. We were forcefully retired from the force when we were yet to attain the age of 60 years and neither have we spent 35years in the police force.

“We approached the National Industrial  Court, Abuja, to challenge the action of the force against us and the court presided over by Hon. Justice Oyewumi Oyebiola gave an order that we should be reinstated but to our surprise, the police authority has not obeyed the court judgment up till today.

“It could be noted that the police took the action against us because of the issue on our date of first appointment and the issue has been cleared by the court and there was no appeal on the court judgment.

“Incidentally the police authority had implemented the earlier judgments of the same court involving other police officers, but for inexplicable reasons, the authority refused bluntly to obey the judgment in our own case,” the statement read

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They thus reiterated that the IGP should be committed to prison.

It should be recalled that the court presided over by Justice Oyebiola Oyewumi had, in suit  No. NICN/ABJ/281/2021  filed by Messrs Egong Egwu Egong, Omeh Felix Okechukwu, Paul Obot Umoh  and Galadima Bello, asked the IGP and the Police Service Commission (PSC) and the Secretary of the Police Force to reinstate the officers following their forceful retirement.

The court had granted their prayers, by restraining the defendants from carrying out their intention of retiring them.

Almost one year after, given that judgement on the matter was delivered last April, 19, the complainants have yet to be reinstated.

“Take notice that unless you obey the directions contained in the Certificate of Judgment of Court dated the 19th day of April 2022, you will be guilty of contempt of court and will be liable to be committed to prison,” the letter reminded them.