The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has backed calls for the establishment of state police in Nigeria, insisting that decentralization is critical to addressing the country’s security challenges provided it operates within the rule of law and strict human rights standards.
NHRC Executive Secretary, Chief Anthony Ojukwu, SAN, made the call on Tuesday in Port Harcourt while speaking on a panel at the 66th Annual General Conference of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), themed “Beyond Limits.”
Ojukwu described the current centralized policing model as overstretched and dangerously slow to respond to emerging threats, leaving over 200 million citizens vulnerable.
“If you don’t have State Police, you can never have adequate security,” Ojukwu said. “We have over 200 million people in Nigeria with far less number of policemen to police them. The response time is so long that we only live by God’s grace. Our people live by God’s grace because the system is not working. That must change.”
He argued that state-level policing would allow officers to leverage local knowledge of terrain and community dynamics, enabling quicker interventions and empowering state governors to address localized threats effectively.
However, the NHRC chief cautioned that decentralization must be accompanied by robust oversight, independent governing boards, and legal safeguards to prevent state governments or political actors from weaponizing police forces for repression, unlawful arrests, or torture.
“We must insist that when the National Policing Bill comes, it must be well drafted. There must be a board that runs it. There must be oversight. Otherwise, it will become another problem,” he warned.
Directing a call to action to legal practitioners, Ojukwu urged lawyers to actively monitor police conduct and enforce proper procedures during arrests to guard against executive highhandedness.
He concluded by stressing that effective security and fundamental human rights are mutually reinforcing, urging Nigeria to abandon an outdated policing architecture in favor of a modern, accountable system capable of restoring public confidence.
