HURIWA asks police to end discrimination against women

• Wants dismissed pregnant female officer reinstated

Civil Rights Advocacy group, Human Rights Writers Association Of Nigeria (HURIWA) has asked the Nigeria Police Force (NPF) to put an end to discrimination against women.

This is coming on the heels of a female Police Corporal, Olajide Omolola from Ekiti Command, who was dismissed from service for getting pregnant while being unmarried.

HURIWA, in a statement, urged the Police to immediately reinstate the dismissed female officer.

The group carpeted the National Assembly for failing to expunge section 127 of the Police Act, which discriminates against women in the area of their relationship with the opposite sex. 

It maintained that since that section 127 of the Police Act offends Section 42(1) of the Nigerian Constitution, which prohibits discrimination on the basis of gender, it, therefore, followed that it was null and void to the extent of its inconsistency with section 42(1) of the Nigerian Constitution.

HURIWA said it wondered why single ladies in the police force are by the provision of extant legislation not allowed to become pregnant, whereas policemen, who are single but who go about putting girls in the family way by way of impregnating them are never sanctioned with outright dismissal. 

It said lawmakers at the National Assembly should cover their faces in shame for refusing to jettison section 127 of the Police Act, which offends section 42 (1) of the 1999 Nigerian Constitution on discriminatory policies.

The group wondered why the National Assembly spent all resources to amend the police Act last year “but left sections that are inimical to human rights, such as section 124 that was later struck out by a competent court of law but then section 127 was not amended and now constitute a cog in the wheel of progressive enforcement of fundamental human rights of policewomen in Nigeria.”

The police had in a wireless message with reference number CJ:4161/EKS/IY/Vol.2/236, DTO: 181330/01/2021, said Omolola was dismissed for getting pregnant while unmarried.

The signal originated from the Department of Finance and Administration in Ado Ekiti and was addressed to the Divisional Police Officer at Iye Ekiti, where Omolola was based.

The Chief Financial Officer in Ekiti was asked to relay the information to the Integrated Personnel and Payroll Information System to ensure that her salary was stopped.

The document reads: “Section 127 of the Police Act and Regulation against women police getting pregnant before marriage; W/PC (woman corporal) Olajide Omolola passed out of Police Training School on 24/04/2020 attached to yours, contravened above provisions.

“She stands dismissed from the Force. Dekit her. Retrieve police documents in her possession with immediate effect. O/C CFO Ekiti only. You are to relay the signal to IPPIS Abuja for the stoppage of her salary with immediate effect.

“DECOMPOLS (Deputy Commissioners of Police)/ACPOLS (Assistant Commissioners of Police)/HODs/DPOs Ekiti State only. You are to lecture women police. Treat as very urgent.”