Lagos — The Nigeria Police are in the news again, as always. And as usual not for anything salutary. The entire policemen and women from the Inspector-General of Police to the last recruit are out on the streets queuing.

In a tasking search for ghost workers. It is really funny to know that the police whose work it is to eliminate crime, should exhibit such celebrated inability for accurate record keeping.

As though that was not enough, a Lagos-based national newspaper last week did nearly a full-page feature on how recruitment into the police force is riddled with fraud such that a candidate is required to pay as much as N250, 000 for the recruitment form, plus so many other sums for greasing the palms of some officials and self- appointed recruitment officers. All that came shortly after the former Lagos State Police Commissioner, Alhaji Abubakar Tsav, went full blast on the police and its corrupt agents at the Oputa Panel which has just ended its sitting in Enugu.

What all that adds up to is that the Nigeria Police Force is one giant sick body which requires a radical surgical operation. It is very unfortunate that that has to be so, since it is detrimental to the societal well-being of the Nigerian populace.

There is need for justice in every society. For there to be justice, there has to be security and in order to have security we have to have well paid agents of the state preventing crime, as well as docking criminals and to even guarantee safety on our roads.

It will be right to argue that the problems of the force did not start today, but instead has accumulated over the years as the military neglected the force, some suggest that it is because the military did not want any rival to its supremacy in the then largely subjugated Nigerian social political landscape. However, since Nigeria is now in a democracy, for two years now, there ought to have been manifest exhibition of the political will on the part of government to equip the police to do their work.

But that has not happened. What has happened was that government resorted to a blanket ban on all organisations.

The FG, for instance, came out with a pronouncement banning OPC and all such other groups. In the case of Anambra State Vigilance services the FG got into a little bit of a problem because it is not a tribal group with the agenda to redress perceived injustices against ethnic groups, like OPC and MASSOB, it is a security outfit which the State Assembly of the Anambra State government backed with an enabling law to drastically bring to an end the calamity that Anambra had continued to face concerning insecurity.

The situation got so bad that to carry a polythene bag with a pair of shoes in Onitsha was to sign one's own death warrant. It was a question of a drastic ailment requiring a drastic solution in Anambra State.

And to improve the genuine desires for a secure society on the part of Dr. Chinwoke Mbadinuju, last week he inaugurated an eight man supervisory panel for Bakassi and said that Bakassi would be under the police force.

That is a very clear demonstration of transparency as it concerns the objective of guaranteeing a secure Anambra State. But this piece is not about Anambra or Bakassi, but about the police.

Concerning setting up rival agencies to do the work of the police, the military government of Ibrahim Babangida set the pace by setting up Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC), headed by Professor Wole Soyinka. This came to a head during the Abacha era when there re- emerged a deluge of operations: Operation Sweep, Operation Nkpochapu, all "sound and fury," achieving nothing.

Whether it was for ethnic or security purposes, the emergence of these organisations whether in the past, or now, have only gone to prove that the Nigerian Police Force has failed in its constitution responsibility of policing the country from the Northern to the Southern Atlantic boundaries, due to all sorts of problems. Principal among which is insufficient funding and misplacement of priority on the part of successive administrations.

A situation which has then given room for some highly placed officers to further mismanage the force. Alhaji Tsav actually named a top ranking officer of the force "a prisoner on parole." That may just be his opinion, but it does follow that such characters exploit the loopholes in the system to cruise roughshod on bribery and corruption.

It is only where there is no honest and purposeful supervision that a single exercise such as recruitment will be riddled with fraud. It is unfortunate because what that means is that the new entrants would be dropouts who can afford the dubious fees charged.

What that means is that the force is doomed, for it is the human element, above infrastructure, sophisticated security gadgets, telephone lines, patrol vans, and computers, important as they are, that will ensure a safe and just society. It is true that the police have been given jeeps to work with, but a situation where the policemen and women get owed for months, like many Nigerian workers, does not allow for the best that, is patriotic and honourable.

Having said that, it is also important to maintain that the police as a body should know that hardship is not peculiar to it, and that even if it were, because of its elevated status as a security and crime agency, it has to be seen to always approach justice with clean hands. There is no gain in resorting to extortion and exploitation of innocent citizens, be it during recruitments or at illegal check points.

There is equally no gain in turning to illegal arms dealers supplying syndicates or armed gangs. There is even no redemption in becoming hired killers for or on behalf of dubious moneybags.

The thing for the police rank and file to do is to get a strong union that can mount pressure on the Inspector-General to pray the powers of the day to give police their rightful place. In addition, the entire force should be able to insist on ridding itself of miscreants that taint, the otherwise good work of the greater majority of the force.

chidinma-ibegbu@excite.com