BRING AM, WE GET CHANGE: Why Bassey Emmanuel Must Be Sacked
There is no better time to report the incessant infractions of some 'bad eggs' in the Nigerian Police Force (NPF) mounting illegal road blocks along 9th Mile to Nsukka road, and no better way to report it than this. Students of the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN), who have suffered hell in the hands of these 'stinking eggs' in the NPF are disgusted and tired of the many atrocities committed along this road. There are well-known legal check points along this road and there have been no reported case(s) of contraventions from the uniform men mounting these legal check points.
On Sunday, 12th of October 2014 at about 0300PM, Bassey Emmanuel with some other officers was on an illegal patrol along 9th Mile to Nsukka road, Enugu state. The other officers' identification could not be ascertained and photographs are not available, as it is detrimental to snap photos at that moment without spyware. But, one other officer with an Edo first name initials as 'I' and Friday as the other name on his uniform was identified. Bassey Emmanuel in company of his partners in crime was standing on the high way stopping vehicles and giving unnecessary reasons for asking you to park. I wonder why Bassey, a police officer would stop you and ask whether your vehicle has a plate number, even when seeing that your plate number is displayed conspicuously at the front and rear of your vehicle.
Bassey also went ahead to ask why the plate number is looking old. When he could not find any fault, he asked everyone in the Peace Mass Transit bus I boarded to come down and he began a search on everybody. Bassey emphatically told us to cooperate for the search or he would take us all to the station. When he could not find anything, after searching everyone in the 18-sitter bus, Bassey asked to search the bag I was holding with me. I refused and asked him to tell me why he has to search my bag. He forcefully took hold of my bag, poured everything on it down, hitting my laptop to the tarred road, and took hold of the laptop. He seized my laptop from me and asked for N2,000.00 before the laptop be released! Granted, I forgot my laptop receipt at home in a hurry to see my research supervisor, but, if Bassey was true to his duty, he would not have requested for money and would not have specifically mentioned an amount. That is to show Bassey's interest was driven by the lust for money. I have to call my uncle, a policeman; quoting Bassey's name and ID number to him before Bassey could agree to talk with my uncle and before he released my laptop. Of course, I won't pay a dime; I would rather die with him.
In a sane society where there is rule of law, Bassey would be investigated following this report and if found guilty, suspended to serve a jail term for using state power to oppress law abiding citizens, abuse human rights and the constitutional rights of the people. This reprehensible barbarism at the age of improvement must not continue. I want to say without any fear of intimidation or threat that Bassey Emmanuel with uniform number 399968 is one of the bad egg officers that are in the habit of harassing, intimidating, unnecessarily and forcefully extorting money from scholars plying the aforementioned road. A government structure that retains the likes of Bassey, Friday and co., with a record of persistent gross violations of human rights of citizens cannot be said to be serving the interest and social welfare of citizens. Bassey and his cohorts are not fit for the uniform they are wearing; therefore, he must be sacked! They should be sacked! These kinds of bad eggs have no place in a decent police force.
Bassey Emmanuel (ID Number: 399968) of the Nigerian Police Force is a disgrace and an embarrassment to the Nigerian Police and should be sacked. These are the weeds expected to be uprooted from the Nigerian Police Force if the NPF would assume any sanity. More so, something should be done quickly about the way men of the Nigerian police go about harassing, intimidating and forcefully collecting money from scholars who at times are suffering to make ends meet, plying this road. The activities of these illegal patrol policemen along this ever busy road, and even at other roads of the country, should be checked. At this point, I want to call on the commissioner of police in Enugu state, to quickly react by doing everything possible to fish out these kinds of police officers out of the job to keep the image of the police operating in Enugu clean. What is right must be done to keep the people of Enugu free from police harassment, intimidation and their other forms of criminality. The IG should keep demonstrating that he has zero tolerance for corruption in the NPF, as that is one of the key ways of sanitizing the largely rotten police we currently have. Extortion of money from Nigerians by police officers will continue to thrive if serious measures are not taken to curb the menace. Bassey and his cohorts should be made to serve severe punishment; they should be fired and made to serve a jail term to further the anti-corruption message of the Nigeria Police. This will go a long way to discouraging other likeminded officers from these nefarious acts.
Oyibo, Ediri
0806406929170