Judiciary
By Anayo Ezugwu
THE Federal High Court, Abuja has suspended the planned recruitment of 10,000 constables into the Nigeria Police Force, NPF. Justice Inyang Ekwo, who presided over the matter on Wednesday, October 23, urged that all parties should stay within the bounds of the law until the matter is decided.
The Police Service Commission, PSC, had dragged the Nigeria Police Force, the Inspector General of Police and the Minister of Police Affairs as first, second and third respondents respectively to the court. The PSC in a matter with suit number FHC/ABJ/CS/1120/19 sought an interlocutory injunction restraining the defendants, their officers and representatives, including anybody or person acting on their behalf from appointing, recruiting or attempting to appoint or recruit by any means whatsoever any person into any office in the first defendant pending the hearing and determination of the substantive suit.
But Alex Izinyon, SAN, counsel to the three defendants, sought to join the Attorney General of the Federation as fourth defendant in the matter, to which Kanu Agabi, SAN, lawyer to PSC, agreed and Justice Ekwo adopted. Ekwo had gone ahead to give the plaintiff four days from the date of the order to amend, file and service the processes and the first to third defendants another four days upon service by the plaintiff to amend file and serve their processes.
A November 4, 2019 date was agreed for the matter to resume. Ekwo then told the senior lawyers that they represent the cream of the inner bar and since they had decided to submit the issues between them to the court, all parties must respect the rule of law and stay within bounds until the matter is decided. “I need your assurance on that,” Ekwo had said.
The Nigeria Police in its verified Twitter handle @PoliceNG had last week announced that members of the general public, particularly candidates, who participated in the recruitment exercise were advised to note that the final list of successful candidates will be released only after the receipt of the Recruitment Report and final vetting of the list by the Inspector General of Police.
Realnews recalled that the PSC and the Nigeria Police Force had been at loggerheads over which of the institutions have the powers to recruit police officers. The crisis started with the recent directive by the president for the recruitment of 10,000 police officers to boost the personnel of the force.
The PSC and the office of the IGP are claiming the powers to recruit personnel. While presenting the annual report of the commission to the presidency, the matter came up and the president urged the two to work in synergy. He made no reference to the laws establishing any of the two institutions, but asked the PSC to ‘go and put the police in order’.
The PSC issued a query to Yakubu Jibrin, DIG in charge of training and development, for alleged misconduct namely, releasing names of successful candidates and inviting them to appear for medical screening without the PSC’s permission. Reports said that the IGP had written back to the PSC telling the commission that it had no powers to query the DIG and that the DIG was not under the PSC control.
The IGP was said ti have written to the commission, demanding that the commissioners return the SUVs given to them by former IGP Idris Kpotun ostensibly to assist them in their oversight functions.
– Oct 23, 2019 @ 16:45 GMT |
Tags: 000 constables Court suspends recruitment of 10
