Kingsley Omonobi
11 July 2008
FAMILIES of 55 police officers who were gunned down by dare-devil armed robbers in various shoot out across the country in the early part of this year, and 20 others who sustained gun shot injuries in the encounters, were yesterday presented insurance claims amounting to N32. 072million.
Presenting the cheques which ranged from N100, 000, N250, 000, N500, 000 to N1million for the dead and N48, 000, N58, 000, N100, 000, N120, 000 and N150, 000 to the injured, Deputy Inspector-General of Police in charge of Administration, Ogbona Onovo regretted the rate at which police officers who should be seen as peace keepers at home, are being killed.
"I want to say that the rate of mortality in the Nigerian Police is becoming uncomfortable. This all boils down to the fact that there has been proliferation of arms and ammunition with which these criminals inflict this injuries and death on our personnel".
According to Onovo, "If these criminals don't have access or means to these instruments of coercion, this debilitating impact on the police would not be felt hence government is putting all resources at its disposal to checkmate the influx of small arms and ammunition into the country.
DIG Onovo stated further that it was in line with this that the West African Chiefs of Police Conference currently meeting in Abuja has made checkmating small arms inflow into the sub-region, one of its cardinal agenda for deliberation.
"Policing is the most dangerous job in the world in the circumstance where arms and ammunition are circulating" he told the families adding "what we are doing today by presenting this cheques, is just a token because it cannot replace the lives of your loved ones.
I must emphasized however that it is for the upkeep of the widows and children left behind, not for uncles or brothers or relation of the
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2008 Vanguard. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
