Some books join an existing conversation while others seek to redirect it. Magnus Onyibe’s The Imperative of State Police in Nigeria falls into the latter category. It arrives at a time when the debate over state policing has moved beyond political sloganeering into one of the most pressing constitutional questions facing Nigeria. With insecurity stretching the capacity of the country’s centralised police system, the issue is no longer whether reform is desirable but whether the present structure can adequately serve a federation of more than 220 million people.

For years, public discussion has focused largely on the manifestations of insecurity—kidnappings, insurgency, banditry, communal violence, oil theft and organised crime. Far less attention has been paid to the structure of policing itself. Onyibe argues that Nigeria’s security crisis is not simply the result of operational shortcomings but of institutional design. Better funding and equipment may improve policing, he suggests, but structural defects demand structural reform.

The book opens with a useful historical reminder. Before military rule centralised policing after the events of 1966, regional governments exercised considerable policing powers within Nigeria’s federal arrangement. Onyibe’s point is that state policing is neither an imported idea nor a constitutional novelty. It formed part of Nigeria’s earlier federal experience before military governments reshaped the country’s institutions around central command.

That historical perspective is one of the book’s strengths. Much of the contemporary debate proceeds as though decentralised policing were an untested experiment. Onyibe demonstrates that Nigeria has lived with more than one policing model, inviting readers to view today’s arguments against a broader constitutional backdrop.

History, however, is only the starting point. The greater part of the book examines whether the current security architecture remains fit for purpose. The evidence assembled is sobering. Terrorism in the North-East, banditry in the North-West, communal violence in the Middle Belt, separatist unrest in the South-East, kidnapping across the country’s highways and organised criminal networks operating across state boundaries all expose the limitations of a policing system directed overwhelmingly from the centre.

Yet the author avoids presenting decentralisation as a cure-all. One of the book’s more persuasive features is its recognition that transferring authority to the states, without adequate safeguards, could simply relocate existing problems. Onyibe therefore devotes considerable attention to recruitment standards, training, operational independence, funding, judicial oversight, intelligence sharing and accountability. These are not treated as afterthoughts but as essential conditions for any workable system of state policing.

That emphasis distinguishes the book from much of the public conversation. Too often, the argument is reduced to a choice between centralisation and decentralisation. Onyibe asks a more useful question: what kind of decentralisation would strengthen security while preserving democratic accountability? In doing so, he shifts the discussion from political advocacy to institutional design.

The analysis also benefits from comparative examples drawn from other federal democracies where policing responsibilities are shared across different levels of government. Onyibe does not suggest that foreign models can simply be transplanted into Nigerian conditions. Rather, he uses them to illustrate that federalism and decentralised policing are compatible, provided responsibilities are clearly defined and supported by effective oversight.

The book also recognises that modern policing cannot rely on constitutional reform alone. Onyibe examines the role of technology, integrated command systems, digital intelligence, data analytics and community reporting in improving security. His discussion of Governor Peter Mbah’s technology-driven security initiatives in Enugu State serves as a practical illustration of how institutional reform and technological innovation can reinforce one another.

Equally important is the author’s insistence that policing ultimately depends on public trust. He argues that traditional institutions, local communities and informal networks have an important role in intelligence gathering and conflict prevention. Security, in his conception, is not solely the responsibility of government agencies but the product of cooperation between state institutions and the communities they serve.

The book possesses another notable quality. Much of its content originated as newspaper essays written over more than two decades. Collections of journalism often read like disconnected pieces brought together under a single cover. Here, however, the essays have been carefully organised into a coherent narrative that traces both Nigeria’s changing security landscape and the evolution of the author’s thinking. The result is a sustained argument rather than a compilation of previously published articles.

The volume is further strengthened by contributions from Professor Anthony Kila, who provides the foreword, and former Assistant Inspector-General of Police Tunji Alapini, whose afterword brings the perspective of an experienced policing professional. Their contributions lend additional weight to a work that seeks to bridge public policy, constitutional debate and practical policing.

Published by Inspire Media Services Limited, a member of the Inspire Group, The Imperative of State
Police in Nigeria will be presented on September 10, 2026, at the Abuja Continental Hotel under the theme, Explaining the Grey Areas of State Policing: The Case, the Strategy, the Operations, and the Framework. The organisers have invited senior government officials, lawmakers, governors and security leaders. Given the significance of the subject, the event itself promises to become part of the wider national conversation on security reform.

No serious review should suggest that Onyibe’s book settles the debate. Questions about political interference, uneven institutional capacity among the states and the safeguards needed to prevent abuse remain legitimate concerns. To the author’s credit, he confronts these objections rather than dismissing them. Whether his proposed solutions satisfy every reader is another matter, but they ensure that the discussion moves beyond familiar talking points.

Ultimately, the book succeeds because it treats security as a constitutional and institutional challenge rather than merely a policing problem. It argues that federal institutions must evolve as society changes and that meaningful reform requires careful thought rather than political expediency. Whether Nigeria eventually adopts state police in the form Onyibe advocates will be decided by lawmakers and citizens alike. What his book offers is a carefully reasoned framework for that decision.
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