•Owoseni
For the Criminal justice system to be effective, there is need for the Nigeria Police to be included in the process of law making.
This was the view of the Lagos State Police Commissioner, Fatai Owoseni who hosted members of the state Law Reform Commission (LAWRECOM) on Thursday.
Owoseni noted that the setbacks evident in the justice sector were majorly as a result of the lack of consultation of prosecuting agencies by lawmakers.
While noting that the police does not have control over the lawmakers, Owoseni said some of the laws the legislature usually create turn out to be bottlenecks for the police.
He condemned the proliferation of government owned agencies by legislative Acts, noting that the police still receive the bashing for their failures.
According to him, the police receive most of the condemnation from the public, even when the agency was not to be blamed.
The criminal justice system has always passed the bug with one agency blaming the other.
“If a judge does not sit, it is the police. If the prison authority fails to bring an awaiting trial inmate to court, it is still the police that is blamed. If there is jail break, the police is blamed.
“The problem is that lawmakers do not come for police imput before making laws. We only enforce. Most times, these lawmakers create just to suit their whims and caprice and failure of each is blamed on the police. This is the kind of burden the police carry,” said Owoseni.
While commending the members of the commission who were led by its chairman, Gbolahan Elias, Owoseni said their visit would cement the relationship between both parties.
“Visits like this cement our relationship. It will help us see the areas where there have been gaps and to also see the areas we need capacity building for our police officers. Since we enforce the law, it will enable us to give them input,” he said.
According to the Commissioner, most of the grey areas in the Administration of Criminal Justice have been corrected particularly in Lagos State, just as he stated that the holden charge provision in the law was commendable.
“Most of the areas where we used to have challenges in prosecuting such as holden charge have been taken care of in the new law.
“Now, we are allowed to take our suspects to court for remand and we have a window of opportunity within which we are enabled to complete investigation.
“That is why institutions like this and interaction of this nature is of great help.
“The new law has put us on our toes. It is in line with the policing philosophy of the Inspector General of Police (IGP) Solomon Arase, which is intelligence led.
“Police men do not have to arrest suspects and arraign them before looking for evidence for trial. We are interested in knowledge based policing, so, we won’t have a situation where u charge a suspect to court and start scouting for evidence to prosecute. We are supposed to prosecute and not persecute,” he said.
Earlier, Gbolahan explained the need to partner with the police, noting that their imputs as the enforcement agency was necessary in the planned review of the state’s Criminal Justice Law.
