#EndSARS: Police commission receives report, pledges to probe abuses

The Police Service Commission has pledged to investigate alleged police misconduct contained in the report of the Action Group on Free Civic Space in Nigeria, which was presented to the commission in Abuja.

The group, led by Ms. Zikora Ibe and accompanied by Okechukwu Nwanguma and Kingsley Godwin presented the report titled, ‘ENDSARS: Police brutality, protests and shrinking civic space in Nigeria.’

Speaking while receiving the delegation on behalf of the Chairman of the Commission, Justice Clara Ogunbiyi, retired Justice of the Supreme Court and Commissioner representing the judiciary in the commission said the report was far reaching and that the commission will need to further investigate the serious allegations contained in it.

According to a statement on Monday by the PSC spokesman, Ikechukwu Ani, Ogunbiyi said the report contained a lot of allegations and information which the commission would need to verify.

She commended the group for the painstaking job, noting that the commission will continue to do its best to improve the workings of the Nigeria Police Force and would continue to ensure that it operates within defined rules and regulations and with respect to democratic tenets.

Ibe in her presentation said the group was demanding that errant police officers of the dreaded SARS must be held accountable.

She said, “We urge the National Human Rights Commission and the Enugu state Judicial Panel of Inquiry to commit to bringing the officers and politicians named and identified by victims in this report to justice for their various roles in perpetrating and aiding police brutality”.

She also demanded an investigation into alleged sale of bodies of murdered protesters by SARS operatives to university teaching hospitals as cadavers for the teaching and practice of medicine.

“The group is also demanding that the capacity of oversight bodies like the Complaints Response Unit, the Police Service Commission, Ministry of Police Affairs and the National Human Rights Commission, to enforce discipline in the police should be strengthened,” the statement noted.