Managing police personnel for effective crime control in Nigeria

2016 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-22 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eke Chijioke Chinwokwu
Keyword(s):  
Population Size ◽  
Police Officers ◽  
Industrial Development ◽  
Crime Control ◽  
Police Force ◽  
National Bureau ◽  
Effective Utilization ◽  
Political Interference ◽  
Police Personnel ◽  
Control And Prevention

This study examines the ways in which police authorities manage their personnel, as well as the factors militating against police authorities in managing their personnel for effective crime control and prevention in Nigeria. The study used both quantitative and qualitative designs to attempt to identify the criteria used in posting police officers. Data were obtained through questionnaires from 360 randomly selected respondents complemented by 15 in-depth interviews (IDI) undertaken in three geo-political regions in Nigeria namely: southeast, southwest and north central. The three geo-political regions were purposively chosen based on the incidences of armed robbery recorded in each. The study also used secondary data sourced from the National Bureau of Statistics and the Nigeria Police Force as reference materials. Simple percentages and chi-squared tests were employed to analyse the collected data. The qualitative data were content analysed. The findings revealed that factors such as crime rate, population size, industrial development and land mass or political interference were not clearly defined criteria used in the posting of personnel. The number of police in a region does not equate to more or less crime; effective crime control and prevention depend on proper and effective utilization, as well as management, of police personnel. Police authorities are culpable of mismanagement of police personnel for personal gain to the detriment of citizens; most states are under-policed and under-staffed. This study also found that factors militating against the effective utilization and management of police personnel include: corruption, political interference, ethno-religious consideration, lack of funds and lack of facilities. Thus, the study recommends among other things, that the distribution of police personnel should be anchored to the population size, industrialization and volume of criminality in a particular place; there should be a gross reduction in the numbers of personnel attached to political officials, whereas those attached to individuals who are not entitled to personal police protection must be withdrawn and efforts made to recruit more people into the police force.

Using the lie detector test to curb corruption in the Nigerian Police Force

2019 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 874-880
Author(s):  
Ehi Eric Esoimeme
Keyword(s):  
Professional Competence ◽  
Police Force ◽  
High Rate ◽  
National Bureau ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Police Personnel ◽  
External Examiner ◽  
Detection Of Deception ◽  
Sales Agent ◽  
Drugs And Crime

Purpose This paper aims to critically examine the lie detector test policy of the Nigeria Police Force to determine if the policy is capable of curbing corruption in the Nigerian Police Force. Design/methodology/approach The analysis took the form of a desk study, which analyzed various documents and reports such as the report by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and the National Bureau of Statistics titled “Corruption in Nigeria – Bribery: Public Experience and Response,” Transparency International’s Corruption Perceptions Index 2017, the report by the International Police Science Association and the Institute for Economics and Peace. Findings This paper determined that the lie detector test policy of the Nigeria Police Force could achieve its desired objectives if the following recommendations are implemented: The Nigeria Police Reform Trust Fund bill should be given accelerated consideration in the Senate and House of Representatives based on its urgency and significance for the new lie detector test policy of the Nigeria Police Force. There is need for the Nigerian Police to have enough funds to conduct trainings for police personnel who are chosen as examiners for the lie detector tests. The Nigerian National Assembly will need to pass an Act to provide for the licensing of detection of deception examiners – commonly known as polygraph or lie detector operators – and regulation of that profession. The act should set forth the conditions under which persons may be admitted to practice detection of deception with a polygraph, the standards they must observe and the types of polygraph devices that they may henceforth be used lawfully. This is what was done in the State of Illinois. The Nigeria Police Force is advised to make use of two examiners for the lie detector test: one in-house examiner and one external examiner. The external examiner may be from another country in which corruption is not at a high rate, and must be someone of high integrity and professional competence. This measure may reduce the risk of bribery and corruption in the system. It will also bring more integrity and transparency into the system. The external examiner may also carry out “on the job training” with the in-house examiner while the polygraph exercise is going on. The Nigeria Police Force must make a new policy that mandates that all transactions relating to the purchase of polygraph machines must be conducted in an open and fair manner that recognizes the need for the transaction to be done directly with the seller, and not through a sales agent. This policy may help prevent a situation where a corrupt sales agent connives with a corrupt police officer to defraud the police unit. An ongoing approach to screening should be considered for specific positions, as circumstances change, or for a comprehensive review of departmental staff over a period. The Nigeria Police Force should have a policy that mandates that the lie detector test should be taken once in five years by all staff of the Nigeria Police Force. For staff in very sensitive positions, the lie detector test should be taken every three years. This will enable the lie detector policy to be more effective. Let us take, for example, a person passes the lie detector test genuinely without any influence of corruption; there is still a possibility that the person may change over time. The temptation to follow current employees to collect bribes is very high. But if the Nigeria Police Force put a policy in place that mandates every police personnel to take the lie detector test every five years starting from the first five years after recruitment, the cankerworm called corruption may be curbed effectively. Imagine if every police personnel knew that they were going to be asked by an examiner, five years after working, to confirm if they ever collected bribe during the time they served in the police force; most employees will desist from taking bribes or engaging in corrupt acts. The above measure will ensure that current employees who are chosen as examiners for the lie detector tests are fit and proper persons for the job. Research limitations/implications This paper focuses on the new lie detector test policy of the Nigeria Police Force. It does not address the other anti-corruption policies of the Nigeria Police Force. Originality/value This paper offers a critical analysis of the lie detector test policy of the Nigeria Police Force. It will provide recommendations on how the policy could be strengthened. This is the only paper to adopt this kind of approach.

Improving Efficiency and Ensuring Impartiality of the Police Force

1986 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
pp. 55-64
Author(s):  
G K Valecha ◽  
Subha Venkataraman
Keyword(s):  
Police Officers ◽  
Questionnaire Survey ◽  
Job Security ◽  
Police Force ◽  
Improve Efficiency ◽  
Political Interference ◽  
Harsh Criticism

As the Indian Police force assumes an increasingly important role in the life of the nation, it conies under rigorous scrutiny and harsh criticism. What are its weaknesses and strengths? How can the weaknesses be remedied and strengths reinforced? In this article, G K Valecha and Subha Venkataraman, who have conducted a questionnaire‐survey of Inspector Generals and Deputy Inspector Generals, present the perceptions of these highranking police officers and some prescriptions. Discipline, job security, and esprit de corps are the three major strengths identified and corruption, political interference, and poor interaction within the force, the three weaknesses. Delinking police from politics, encouraging participation, recognizing merit in promotion, and improving motivation are suggested as measures to be adopted to improve efficiency and ensure impartiality of the police force.

scholarly journals Understanding the Nature and Effects of Police-Citizen Encounters in Social Context: The Road Less Traveled

2013 ◽  
Vol 36 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-20
Author(s):  
Alfred R. D'Anca
Keyword(s):  
Police Officers ◽  
Crime Control ◽  
Effective Means ◽  
Community Safety ◽  
Face To Face ◽  
The Road ◽  
Control And Prevention ◽  
Prevention Of Crime ◽  
And Behavior ◽  
Attitudes And Behavior

Aggressive policing tactics have been identified as contributors to declining crime rate trends in urban, culturally diverse neighborhoods. They encompass stop and frisk practices which have spawned negative public opinion that contrasts with its justification by criminal justice officials as an effective means for the control and prevention of crime. The issue, however, begs deeper questions not readily addressed: how does the nature of police-citizen suspicion-based encounters influence the attitudes and behavior of both stakeholders; and does it contribute to effective crime control and prevention? Based on an analysis of theoretical and empirical research in the field, this article argues that a sense of shame and perception of fairness or unfairness are endemic to face-to-face suspicion-based encounters between police officers and the public, and have significant implications for the experience of justice, control and prevention of crime, and policy initiatives to promote community safety.

An Assessment of Unethical Work Behavior Among Police Personnel in Nigeria

2021 ◽  
pp. 76-85
Author(s):  
Olugbemiga Samuel AFOLABI ◽  
Adeyeye Adebowale ◽  
Olumide Omodunbi
Keyword(s):  
Content Analysis ◽  
Police Officers ◽  
Police Force ◽  
Work Behavior ◽  
Ethical Behaviour ◽  
Checks And Balances ◽  
The Public ◽  
Ethical Codes ◽  
Maximum Productivity ◽  
Police Personnel

The Nigerian police force is an institution established to protect the lives and properties of residents. Some of her duties include tackling armed robbery, banditry, recovery of stolen assets, investigation of cases, and settling violence-related issues among persons. Just like every other institution, her operations are premised on certain ethical codes and conduct which guarantees checks and balances in her relationship with ordinary citizens. Maximum productivity can be achieved by the Nigerian police if only they display ethical behaviour in the discharge of their lawful duties to the public. Growing unethical work behaviour among Nigerian police officers has drawn attention to the various despicable and condemnable acts perpetrated by some personnel. This study makes a scholarly attempt to investigate the trend of the unethical work behaviour in the Nigerian police force. Using content analysis, the findings suggest that only a handful of Nigerian police officers display professionalism and ethical behaviour in the discharge of their duties.

Policing the British Empire on the Bund: The Origin of the Sikh Police Unit in Shanghai

2017 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 53-73
Author(s):  
Cao Yin
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
British Empire ◽  
Police Officers ◽  
Reference Point ◽  
Police Force ◽  
Imperial History ◽  
Municipal Police ◽  
British Colonial ◽  
British Colonies ◽  
Modern Shanghai

Red-turbaned Sikh policemen have long been viewed as symbols of the cosmopolitan feature of modern Shanghai. However, the origin of the Sikh police unit in the Shanghai Municipal Police has not been seriously investigated. This article argues that the circulation of police officers, policing knowledge, and information in the British colonial network and the circulation of the idea of taking Hong Kong as the reference point amongst Shanghailanders from the 1850s to the 1880s played important role in the establishment of the Sikh police force in the International Settlement of Shanghai. Furthermore, by highlighting the translocal connections and interactions amongst British colonies and settlements, this study tries to break the metropole-colony binary in imperial history studies.

Empowering Women in Blue Uniforms—Gender and Police in South Africa

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Shanta Singh ◽  
Sultan Khan
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Police Officers ◽  
Police Work ◽  
Police Force ◽  
Police Culture ◽  
The South ◽  
South African Police Service ◽  
Female Police Officers ◽  
South African Police ◽  
Female Officers

Gender in the police force has received scant attention by researchers, although there are complex social dimensions at play in how male and female law enforcement officers relate to each other in the workplace. Given the fact that males predominate in the police force, their female counterparts are often marginalised due to their sexual orientation and certain stereotypes that prevail about their femininity. Male officers perceive female officers as physically weak individuals who cannot go about their duties as this is an area of work deemed more appropriate to men. Based on this perception, female officers are discriminated against in active policing and often confined to administrative duties. This study looks at how female police officers are discriminated against in the global police culture across the globe, the logic of sexism and women’s threat to police work, men’s opposition to female police work, gender representivity in the police force, and the integration and transformation of the South African Police Service to accommodate female police officers. The study highlights that although police officers are discriminated against globally, in the South African context positive steps have been taken to accommodate them through legislative reform.

“Laying Hands” and Learning to Touch and Grab in the Police Academy

2019 ◽  
pp. 446-468
Author(s):  
Brian Lande
Keyword(s):  
Police Officer ◽  
Police Officers ◽  
Gain Control ◽  
Police Force ◽  
Police Culture ◽  
Police Academy ◽  
Attitudes And Beliefs ◽  
Police Recruits ◽  
Hands On

Research on the formation of police officers generally focuses on the beliefs, accounts, and categories that recruits must master. Becoming a police officer, however, is not simply a matter of acquiring new attitudes and beliefs. This article attends to an unexplored side of police culture—the sensorial and tactile education that recruits undergo at the police academy. Rubenstein wrote in 1973 that a police officer’s first tool is his or her body. This article examines the formation of the police body by examining how police recruits learn to use their hands as instruments of control. In police vernacular, this means learning to “lay hands” (a term borrowed from Pentecostal traditions) or going “hands on.” This chapter focuses on two means of using the hands: searching and defensive tactics. It describes how instructors teach recruits to use their hands for touching, manipulating, and grabbing the clothing and flesh of others to sense weapons and contraband. It also examines how recruits are taught to grab, manipulate, twist, and strike others in order to gain control of “unruly” bodies. It concludes by discussing the implications of “touching like a cop” for understanding membership in the police force.

Investigating Corruption in the Afghan Police Force

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Danny Singh
Keyword(s):  
Police Officers ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Structured Interview ◽  
Police Force ◽  
Public Confidence ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Police Corruption ◽  
State Legitimacy ◽  
Post Conflict ◽  
Political Economic

This book provides a unique study on the lower ranks of the Afghan police force due to the lack of empirical evidence of what attributes to the causes, practices and consequences of corruption in this institution. The book is divided into a number of sections. It commences with an understanding of how corruption, and narrowly police corruption, impact on the police force, state legitimacy and the strategies in place to mitigate such problems as part of broader security and post-conflict reconstruction initiatives. The theoretical framework comprises political, economic and cultural drivers of police corruption by drawing on semi-structured interviews with elites and a survey and structured interview conducted with street-level police officers. The findings infer that weak oversight and low pay are causes of police corruption which intensify bribery and roadside extortion. The lack of professionalism, partly due to short and unclear training, and patronage are deemed as meanings of police corruption. In terms of motivation, there is no sense of pride in Afghan policing to fulfil a clear mandate. Moreover, non-meritocratic recruitment is prevalent which exacerbates local influences, loyalties and job buying in either high-drug cultivating or urban areas. To curb patronage, police officers are rotated to distant provinces but economic hardship is further increased when catering for large families with fewer breadwinners. The book concludes that the problems with police corruption and failure to combat it results in low public confidence and state illegitimacy which can support violent opposition groups to create further instability in war-torn societies.

School Crime Control and Prevention

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip J. Cook ◽  
Denise C. Gottfredson ◽  
Chongmin Na
Keyword(s):  
Crime Control ◽  
School Crime ◽  
Control And Prevention

Trials of loyalty: Ethnic minority police officers as ‘outsiders’ within a greedy institution

2012 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 354-369 ◽  
Author(s):  
Abby Peterson ◽  
Sara Uhnoo
Keyword(s):  
Ethnic Minority ◽  
Police Officers ◽  
Police Force ◽  
Police Culture ◽  
Police Organization ◽  
Security Officers ◽  
Minority Officers ◽  
New Recruits

In this article we interrogate how ethnicity interfaces with the police culture in a major Swedish police force. While addressing administrative levels, in particular police security officers’ screening of new recruits, we focus on the role that loyalty plays in defining how ethnicity interacts with mechanisms of exclusion and inclusion in the structures of rank-and-file police culture. The police authorities, perceived as ‘greedy institutions’, demand and enforce exclusive loyalty. We argue that ethnic minority officers are rigorously tested as regards their loyalty to their fellow officers and to the police organization, and the demands made on their undivided loyalty and the misgivings as to their unstinting loyalty act as barriers to inclusion in the organization.

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