The Inspector General of Police (IGP), Tunji Disu, on Friday declared that the era of impunity in the Nigeria Police was over, just as he promised to upgrade the traffic warden unit of the Force.

The IGP spoke in Benin during his official visit to the Edo State Command where he had an interactive session with officers of the state command.

Disu, who said until the interactive session, he never imagined some of the points raised by the officers of the Command, noted: “I am living here with what they have told me in confidence. And they have been able to open my thoughts.”

“Now I have one or two things to do when I get back to Abuja. Things I never gave thought to. For example, an officer of the traffic warden stood up and said, for many years now, there have not been recruitments into the corps of traffic wardens. That got me thinking. The traffic warden unit should be upgraded. So when I get back home, we are going to talk about it.”

Speaking on an end to impunity, the IGP, who made reference to the recent incident where a police officer shot dead a civilian who did not struggle at the point of arrest, said: “That’s impunity. You arrested somebody who was not struggling with you, you brought him out in daylight and you shot him.”

He added: “The police rose up to the occasion immediately, tried them, dismissed them, and they are going to charge them in court. That is the meaning of impunity.

“Like I mentioned earlier, the era of impunity is over. We have to have the new Nigerian police force. I know I cannot do it alone, that is why I have come here to talk to them, so that all of us will be on the same page.”

He disclosed that “they gave me their word that they will have a new police. A new police that the community, the state, the Nigerian people own as our own police.”

Also speaking, the state Commissioner of Police, Monday Agbonika, urged the IGP to extend his support “to this command in the area of logistics, tactical support, and personal development.”

According to him, “the command intensified high visibility policing, aggressive bush combing, operations, confidence building patrols, and intelligence driven raids across identified criminal hideouts and flash points within the state,” hence the IGP support is needed.