Police chief says corruption has "drastically reduced" in Nigeria

The Inspector General of Police, IGP, Ibrahim Idris, said corruption has drastically reduced amongst police personnel despite several allegations of bribery and corruption against the force.

Mr. Idris made this known on Tuesday at a stakeholder’s workshop tagged “Speaking for the Nigerian Police Force” organised by CLEEN foundation held at Nicon Luxury Hotels, Abuja.

The forum is a two-day capacity building training on “Effectiveness Communication and Public Relations in Nigeria” under its Law Enforcement and Public Engagement project in Nigeria organised for Police spokespersons.

The IGP, who was represented by the Deputy Inspector General of Police, Habila Joshack, said Public Relations Department of the Nigeria Police Force is relentless on its effort to forestall further denting of its public image.

“Since the creation of Nigeria Police Public Relations department in 1961, it has evolved over the years with the trends of existing governments and has consistently worked towards the implementation of its mandate.

“However, the conduct of some police personnel has caused serious image for the Force whereby the duties of some police officers have been compromised because of some social maladies plaguing the country as whole. Chiefly, among these is corruption which permeates both the public and private sectors of the country”, he said.

The police chief, who is also accused of corruption by a senator, noted that some ”internal working mechanisms” have been introduced by the present police management and “it is yielding positive result to a large extent as incidents of corruption has drastically reduced in the Force.”

“It is common to hear allegations of corruption, incompetency, unprofessional conducts and other questionable practices that have nothing to do with normal police duty or maintenance of law and other being levelled against a few police officers.

“This is premised on our firm conviction that if the image of the Police Force is not good before the public, the effectiveness of the police towards fighting crime and reducing corruption (may be affected)”, he added.

In his reaction earlier, Benson Olugbuo, executive director, CLEEN Foundation, said his organisation had the mission to hold public institutions including the police accountable to the people.

“The foundation has the objective of promoting public safety, security and access to justice. And we do that through empirical research, legislative advocacy and publications in partnership with government, civil society and the private sector.

“We are working closely with the Nigeria police Force to consciously promote its image as well as build community relationship and trust for the institution with some of our projects which include the ‘stop the bribe campaign’, the police station visitor’s week, for the purpose of improving police neighbourhood relationship and by extension, building community trust”.

Apart from perceived endemic corruption in the police, the Nigeria Police Force was recently rated the worst in the world by the World Internal Security and Police Index International, WISPI.

The 2016 report rates the Nigeria Police Force the “worst” globally in terms of its ability to handle internal security challenges.

Tuesday’s event was attended by Emmanuel Ojukwu, Provost, Public Relations School of the Nigeria Police Force; Fatima Mohammed, National Human Rights Commission representative; the Market Women Association led by Hadiza Ishaku; and 32 police command spokespersons across the nation.

The representative of the market women association, Mrs. Ishaku, in her remarks appealed to the federal government to adequately equip the Nigeria Police to enable them tackle internal security challenges effectively.

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Hundreds of migrants in Libya repatriated back to Nigeria

More than 200 Nigerian migrants stranded in Libya have been returned to their home country, Nigerian officials said.

The 242 migrants landed at Lagos airport on a Libyan airline flight at around 9pm local time on Tuesday. Among them were women carrying children and at least one man in a wheelchair.
Nigerian authorities say they worked on returning the migrants from Libya in collaboration with the International Organization of Migration. (IOM)

Some of the 242 men and women who returned had been in Libyan detention camps while some of them willingly approached the Nigerian embassy in Libya to return home because of hardship there, authorities said.


Abike Dabiri, SSA to President Buhari said the Nigerian government had been working with the IOM, and the Nigerian Commission for Refugees and Migrants (NCFRMI) and other local agencies for the past year to bring Nigerians back home.

Dabiri told CNN that around 5000 Nigerians have come back from Libya in the past year. She said: "The President has said any Nigerian who wants to come back should be brought back, so IOM has been helping out."

The NCIFRM said it has been processing on average between eight to 10 flights per month of Nigerians returning from Libya.

There were poignant scenes as the men and women touched down at Lagos Murtala Muhammad airport. One man, visibly moved, knelt down on the tarmac and made the sign of the cross as he got off the plane.

Nikki Laoye, an ambassador for NCFRMI who filmed the arrivals and posted them on her Instagram page, told CNN: "It was quite emotional seeing this. We heard about their ordeal in the desert, some of them were praying to die. No water to drink, thrown into jail and finally given the option to go back to their country."

"Many of them had traveled illegally through the desert trying to reach Italy via Libya before finding themselves in tight situations, thrown into jail for illegal entry or falling into the hands of wrong people and being sold into slavery/prostitution."

Laoye said the new arrivals would be profiled and registered by the Nigerian authorities. Some of them were taken to a shelter run by the NCIFRM in Lagos, where they can remain for up to 90 days.
She added that officials from Edo State, where a large number of the migrants are from, were also airside to take them back to the state.

CNN

Video - One million Nigerians to learn programming skills by 2019

Authorities have launched an initiative to put Lagos at the frontier of technology on the continent. "Code Lagos" aims to train around one million people in computer programming by 2019. It's open to all residents in the city -- from primary schoolchildren to adults Badmus reports.

Lagos to overtake Nairobi as startup capital of Africa

As Africa’s tech startups and their founders go about creating disrupting industries or, in some cases, building new ones, they’ve typically tended to mushroom across three major ecosystems: Nairobi, Cape Town and Lagos.

But over the past year, Lagos’ claim as the continent’s startup epicenter has gained currency. For starters, it’s the continent’s most valuable ecosystem with its startups typically raising far more in early-stage funding. It’s also home to e-commerce heavyweights such as Jumia and Konga and has birthed some of the continent’s best known startups including Andela, iROKO and Flutterwave which have all attracted major global investor interest. Hence, it’s not surprising the world’s biggest tech companies have been paying some attention and, now, they’re backing that up with action.

Lagos, being Africa’s largest city and the commercial center of Africa’s largest economy, has seen its ecosystem grow rapidly time largely thanks to work that’s been done to build the its “Yabacon Valley.” That work is paying off: last year, Nigeria attracted more investment than any other startup ecosystem in Africa.

Last week, Facebook said it will open a tech hub in Lagos—it’s first in Africa—”early next year.” The hub is in collaboration with Co-Creation Hub, one of Nigeria’s most prominent startup hubs, and will have incubation programs for startups and developers. The social network giant will also run training programs for 50,000 Nigerians as part of a digital skills training program. Facebook’s decision to deepen its operations in Nigeria comes a little over a year after Mark Zuckerberg, its CEO, chose Lagos for his first visit to Africa.

But it follows on the heels of a similar move by Google. In July, while on his first visit to Lagos, Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google, announced the company’s plans to open its first Google Launchpad Space outside the United States in Lagos. Earlier this month, it hosted the first ever Google Developers Launchpad Start, a one week long boot-camp, for early stage startups in Lagos.

But it follows on the heels of a similar move by Google. In July, while on his first visit to Lagos, Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google, announced the company’s plans to open its first Google Launchpad Space outside the United States in Lagos. Earlier this month, it hosted the first ever Google Developers Launchpad Start, a one week long boot-camp, for early stage startups in Lagos.

The incubator plans to host 12 companies its first year in Lagos. Fu says the the “quality” of Nigerian entrepreneurs that have previously participated in MEST’s Accra program has been a pointer to the possibilities in Lagos.

That’s a view shared by Bertil van Vugt, business development lead for VC4Africa, a platform that connects entrepreneurs with resources and funding. “What has changed over the last two or three years is that from the quality we saw in the beginning, we’re now really starting to see the quality [of Nigerian start-ups],” van Vugt said at the MEST Lagos launch. “I spent some time in Nairobi a couple years back when it was really the start-up capital of Africa but we’ve seen this start-up capital status shift to Lagos.”

Much of Kenya’s reputation as the leading startup ecosystem in Africa has been down to its pioneering use of mobile money technology, particularly through the Safaricom-owned M-Pesa, and its impact on ordinary Kenyans and the local economy. It’s also become well-known for a concentration of social enterprise start-ups that have received attention—and millions of investment dollars—globally. One of such is M-Kopa, a startup that helps customers in East Africa stay connected to electricity using low cost pay-as-you-use solar systems.

Quartz

30 hostages rescued by Nigerian Army and 14 terrorists killed

The Nigerian Army said its troops attached to Operation Lafiya Dole under the army’s 202 Battalion, 21 Brigade in conjunction with the Mobile Strike Team, MST, killed 14 terrorists and rescued 30 hostages on Saturday.

The operation ended with the rescue of the hostages from Boko Haram terrorist’s enclaves in Abusuriwa, Newchina, Bonzon, Usmanari, Goyayeri, Shitimari, Gashimari, Awaram amongst other villages in Bama Local Government Area of Borno State.

According to a statement issued on Tuesday by the Director Army Public Relations, Sani Usman, it said the operation led to the capture of one suspected terrorist, while many fled.

“The troops whose continuous resolve in routing out the remnants of the suspected terrorists hibernating within the Brigade’s Area of Responsibility ensured that their superior fire power made the terrorists to flee in disarray leading to the capture of one suspected terrorist while 8 of the Boko Haram terrorists were neutralised.”

“In addition, the troops also rescued three men, 12 women as well as 15 children, among whom were an aged man and a woman held captive by the Boko Haram terrorists”, he said.

“The suspected terrorist has been handed over to the relevant authorities for further interrogation, while the rescued civilian captives are being attended to”, he added.

Mr. Usman, a brigadier general, said the troops were also able to recover four AK-47 rifles, three magazines, seven dane guns and machetes, amongst other items.

The statement also noted that in similar operation, troops of 152 Battalion of the Brigade ambushed some fleeing terrorists and killed five of them, while troops of 151 Battalion also deployed at the Forward Operations Base, Darel Jamel, killed a terrorist in an ambush.

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