• Officers to undergo regular mental checkup
DUE to the resolve of the Federal Government to deploy police and other paramilitary personnel to ensure restoration of civil authority in liberated areas in the North East, the Deputy Inspector General of Police (DIG) Operations has moved with a team of intelligence officers to Borno State for reconnaissance and other surveillance activities.

Meanwhile, the police management team has directed that policemen bearing firearms in the course of performing their duties must be subjected to psychological evaluation every three months, to stem the rising cases of extra-judicial killings.

The Guardian gathered from the Force Public Relations Officer (FPRO) Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) Olabisi Kolawole, that Sotonye Wakama, the DIG Ops “has moved into Maiduguri for an assessment visit, code named RECEE (Reconnaissance) in the area, prior to deployment of police officers and other law enforcement agencies.”

She said this is part of the efforts to restore civil authority in the areas ravaged by Boko Haram insurgents. Most of the areas affected by the insurgents have been striped of all forms of communally accepted authority.

Recall that the Minister of Interior, Abdulrahman Dambazau, during the week visited Maiduguri on assessment, where he saw that most police posts and other offices of paramilitary agencies supervised by the ministry were forced to shut down their operations in the region following repeated attacks by Boko Haram assailants.

The Inspector General of Police (IGP) Solomon Arase, had said in December 2015 that the police had “deployed a total of 3,000 offices as holding forces to the liberated areas in the North East with the task of restoring civil authority and leading the post insurgency in this region.”

Although Arase gave the number of the officers that would be deployed, the FPRO said the exact number, as well as the actual date for the deployment of personnel to the area would be determined as soon as the reconnaissance report of the assessment team led by Wakama returns.

A statement issued by the FPRO said the police leadership, “has ordered that all police officers bearing firearms in the performance of official duties be subjected to psychological test and evaluation to ensure that they are mentally and emotionally fit to perform their duties.”

Arase said the intention is to appraise and determine the mental health condition of officers to decide where they would be posted, noting that, “it is aimed at eliminating cases of irregularities in handling of weapons by policemen, as well as protecting the public whom the police has the constitutional duty to serve, and not to continue killing innocent and law-abiding citizens.”