Usman Baba Alkali, the Inspector-General of Police (IGP), will be taking punitive actions against top officers, including Commissioners of Police and Assistant Inspectors-General of police, in any commands, zones or areas where an attack is orchestrated against Nigeria Police Force, FIJ has exclusively gathered.

Aggrieved by the brazen attacks that often lead to the carting away of police firearms and sometimes death of officers on duty, Alkali said such an unjustifiable “trend is no longer tolerable and must stop forthwith”.

The IGP affirmed that “henceforth, stern disciplinary actions, including redeployment of any zonal, state command commissioner of police and other officers in whose jurisdiction such unjustifiable loss of firearms is reported shall be initiated”.

The IGP’s latest warnings and directives were contained in an internal message FIJ obtained on Wednesday night.

“I have observed with grave concern the rising incidents of attacks on police facilities and personnel and the carting away of arms and ammunition under questionable circumstances by the attackers,” the police head noted.

“Even more worrisome is that these arms are lost with little or no resistance by the attacked police personnel.”

Alkali also listed Kogi, Delta, Anambra and Rivers State as the four top places where the police attacks are rampant.

The IGP said the force has become so volatile largely because of “poor alert level” and “supervisory dereliction”.

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“This development often results from a poor alert level of personnel at the stations, patrol duties, stop-and-search locations or other operations,” Alkali noted. “It also results from supervisory dereliction by line supervisors at zonal, state commands, area commands and divisional command levels of the force and by PMF, CTU, SPU and other commanders of special operational units. 

“Despite several and constant warnings,  this trend has persisted to a level that is becoming a daily sequence with the most recent reported in Kogi, Delta, Anambra and Rivers State Command among others.”

In separate attacks on November 29, FIJ had also reported that three officers were killed in Abia state, and their weapons carted away. Although the police combed the nearby forests to apprehend the attackers, their search was futile.

Again, on Monday, some fully-armed men suspected to be members of the Indigenous People of Biafra, staged a successful attack on the Abia State Police Command after disguising as soldiers.

The suspected IPOB members killed one officer and went away with his firearm.