Every time a major kidnapping occurs in Nigeria, there is an almost automatic rush to blame governors. While governors cannot escape scrutiny for the security atmosphere within their states, the Constitution is very clear about where primary responsibility for security lies.
The Chief Security Officer of a state is often assumed to be the governor. That is politically convenient, but constitutionally inaccurate. Under the 1999 Constitution, policing, internal security, intelligence gathering, firearms control and law enforcement remain on the Exclusive Legislative List.
The Nigeria Police Force answers ultimately to the Federal Government through the President, who is the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces and exercises authority over the nation’s security architecture. A governor cannot recruit police officers, deploy them independently, discipline them, determine their operational priorities or create a parallel policing structure.
In many instances, governors provide vehicles, fuel, logistics and accommodation for security agencies over which they have no command authority. When kidnappers operate successfully, it is first a failure of intelligence, policing and law enforcement.
These are federal responsibilities before they become state concerns.This is why I find it curious that public outrage often targets governors while largely overlooking the constitutional custodian of national security.
That said, the answer is not as simplistic as shouting “state police.” State police may improve local response times, community intelligence and familiarity with terrain, but they do not magically solve insecurity.
Nigeria’s kidnapping crisis is driven by weak intelligence networks, porous borders, illegal arms proliferation, unemployment, poor criminal justice administration and the growing profitability of ransom payments. State police would still operate within these realities.
More importantly, many of the same political actors demanding state police today have not demonstrated strong institutional management of existing local government structures.
Without robust safeguards, state police could easily become instruments of political intimidation rather than instruments of public safety.
The Oyo kidnapping should therefore provoke a more honest constitutional conversation.The first question should not be, “What is the governor doing?” The first question should be, “How did federal intelligence, federal policing and federal security architecture fail to prevent and disrupt this crime?
”The second question should be, “What reforms are required to make security more local without creating thirty-six different versions of political policing?”
Nigeria does not merely have a security problem.Nigeria has a constitutional literacy problem.
Until citizens understand who is responsible for what, accountability will continue to travel in the wrong direction.
Kunle Lawal is Executive Director, Electoral College, Nigeria