Osinbajo's directive won't end SARS brutality

I'm sorry to be the wet blanket this once. My sincere apologies.

Osinbajo ordered the Inspector General of Police to “overhaul the management and activities of SARS and ensure that any unit that will emerge from the process, will be intelligence-driven and restricted to the prevention and detection of armed robbery and kidnapping, and apprehension of offenders linked to the stated offences, and nothing more”.

Nothing good can emerge from SARS as presently constituted. The rot and monster that is SARS won’t change simply because of a presidential directive or a change of name. Like elsewhere in the police and in the nation’s other institutions, the rot in SARS will require more than cosmetic surgery or overhaul to fix.

I like that IGP Ibrahim Idris quickly responded to the presidential directive by tinkering with the SARS chain of command. For instance, what we know as SARS will now be called FSARS (Federal Special Anti-Robbery Squad) and the operations of FSARS will be overseen by a Commissioner of Police who will act as the overall head of the Federal Special Anti-Robbery Squad nationwide.

According to the police high command, FSARS operatives will undergo psychological and medical evaluation, their uniforms will be redesigned; complete with identity tags, and officers have been barred from stop and search operations.

It all sounds really nice doesn’t it?

My worry is how far the police high command, the committee of Senior Police officers, Technical Consultants, Human Rights/Civil Society organizations (CSOs) will go to review the activities of FSARS on a periodic, permanent basis.

My worry borders on whether the police high command will be transparent enough with members of the public on the entire overhaul implementation process. I’m worried that when members of the public dial the numbers issued to report brutality and extortion at the hands of FSARS officers, they will be given short shrift, told off, or their complaints won’t be taken on board, or the phones won’t be picked or that the phone lines won’t even connect.

I’m afraid that FSARS won’t be any different from SARS and that laptop wielding young men would still be randomly stopped, frisked, asked to unlock their phones and laptops and asked to part with some money right on the streets where no one is watching.

I’m not so confident that the SARS operatives who have been wired to beat up and extort, will change simply because of a presidential directive. I’m afraid that the police IGP who famously disobeyed President Buhari at the peak of the herdsmen crisis in Benue, won’t consider this latest directive from his bosses worth his time because he is the head of an institution that is so corrupt, uncouth and unruly. I am afraid that this whole "overhaul" and the euphoria it berthed, will amount to very little at the end of the day if the basics aren't dealt with.

Beyond the presidential directive and the IGP’s public statement about carrying them out, what SARS requires is a whole value re-orientation. SARS is what it has become because the police force is intrinsically corrupt and has been wired to extort motorists and ask for bribe at every opportunity.

SARS is what it has become because the institution from whence it emanated, is just as unruly and shameless. To overhaul or end SARS, the police force as presently constituted has to be overhauled as well. To overhaul SARS, police officers have to be paid well and on time. To end SARS, the federal government has to be serious about sacking police officers who are caught soliciting bribes or brutalising innocent folks on street corners.

A conversation on reforming SARS without reforming the police force as we know it, would be an exercise in futility. SARS or FSARS is a microcosm of the police force in particular and the Nigerian society in general. The brutal officers at SARS didn’t fall from the sky. They came from amongst us. They have been trained to be poor ambassadors of the unkempt uniform they wear.

To deal a deadly blow to the SARS menace, we first have to make sure that our police officers are happy at their jobs. When they are not, they transfer that anger and frustration on society. To deal with SARS, we've got to get back to cleaning up one of the filthiest police forces known to mankind.