Nigeria Police Boss Says Police Is Under-funded

The Inspector General of Police in Nigeria has called for more funding for the Police Force, saying that the force may not be able to pay the salaries of its personnel in 2014.
There has been a shortfall of 14. 4 billion Naira in the personnel cost earmarked for the police in 2014.
At the 2014 budget defence in the Senate, the Inspector General, Mohammed Abubakar, said the budget office earmarked 279 billion Naira for personnel cost against 293 billion Naira required to pay police personnel.
Mr Abubakar also drew the attention of the committee to the steady decline in budgetary allocations for overhead for the police despite the increasing security challenges it had to contend with.
He said the slight increase in capital expenditure in the 2013 budget was because of the injection of constituency projects.
“Out of the sum of 14 billion Naira appropriated for capital expenditure in 2013, only 10.9 billion was released.
“Mr Chairman even the 10 billion, released; I talk about constituency, 4 billion Naira was put for constituencies. So, if you take 4 billion Naira out of 10 billion Naira we are left with 6 billion Naira. And still, we are expected to ensure that there is no robbery, kidnapping and stealing. We are expected to ensure that our officers and men are given the best in terms of welfare. That is why you go about and you see policemen with tattered uniform. It is not because the administration does not care. We do care but you can only give what you have.
“These things don’t come from a personal pocket, they come from a budgetary allocation made by the government and if it is not there, it is not there.
“It takes about 1.7 million Naira to kit one policeman. We are not talking about giving him a walkie-talkie, a pistol, a baton or a telephone and this is the ideal police you want to see. That is why when people come back to this country from England, Europe or America and they ask why our policemen are not like that, I tell them it is because you have not provided those tools for you policemen to be like that,” he said.
The chairman of the Senate Committee on Police Affairs, Senator Paulinus Igwe, said he was worried about the reduction in the budgetary allocation for personnel cost particularly at this time of growing insecurity in the country.