ABUJA – The Nigerian Police said on Monday it would no longer tolerate the unlawful killing of Nigerians in the name of ‘accidental discharge’.
Spokesman of the force, acting CP, Emmanuel Ojukwu, gave the warning at a Forum of Spokespersons of Security and Response Agencies (FOSSRA) organised by I-Nigerian Initiative.
According to Ojukwu, no police man who shoots at somebody and claims accidental discharge will be spared as all guns have a safety mechanisms.
“There is nothing like accidental discharge; every gun has a safety mode; so if a policeman fires at somebody and say it is accidental, we deal with him and charge him for murder because he has been trained to handle arms and arms have safety modes.
“When a gun is fired it must have been cocked; and before you cock, you must have the intention to fire it.
“So if anyone has intention to fire, and he wounds somebody, we will not spare him because we are self-cleansing, we don’t take nonsense; bad eggs don’t survive here and so we throw them out.
“They are now planning to come back we say no and somebody is saying we are difficult.“
Ojukwu said that the police had recorded many successes in the fight against cattle rustling in troubled states such as Zamfara, Sokoto, Nasarawa, and Benue.
He explained that the deployment of 13 police helicopters and the accompanying ground troops helped to expose the rustlers in their places of hiding in the bush.
The police spokesman said the operation mounted against the cattle rustlers would be a continuous one so that those who had gone into hiding would not have the opportunity to return.
Ojukwu said that the police force was working with the military to end insurgency in the North-East and lamented the unprecedented number of casualties the force had suffered in the fight.
“All we know is that we are making sacrifices for the success and survival of this country; we have widows in the police than anybody else in this country.
“We have more father’s less children than anybody else in this country , so it is up to you to bring it to the fore that police are suffering casualties.”
He said that the police was currently being repositioned for better performance, adding that the Inspector-General of Police, Suleiman Abba, had ordered the auditing of the police armory.
According to him, a committee has been constituted to review the technical infrastructure in place.
Giving an update on Wednesday’s bombing at the Federal College of Education, Kontangora, he said that aside the female suicide bomber, another student was badly wounded and later died thus bringing the number of deaths to two. (NAN)