Policemen attached to politicians in the Peoples Democratic Party as well as others serving Very Important Persons in the country will be withdrawn ahead of the February 16 elections.
The Force spokesperson, ACP Frank Mba, told Saturday PUNCH exclusively on Friday that the withdrawal of policemen would affect all categories of VIPs, including state commissioners, businessmen and individuals with police aides.
He said, “The withdrawal of policemen is going to cut across all borders, including politicians, party chairmen, state commissioners and businessmen. It will affect everyone that has policemen attached to them.”
Asked to give the number of personnel that may be affected by the exercise, Mba said he could not provide an estimate.
“I cannot estimate but there are two basic rationale for the withdrawal of policemen; One, we need all hands on deck for the purpose of securing the electoral process.
“Number two, we also need to be proactive in ensuring that unscrupulous people do not hide under the cover of security or policemen providing security to create problems during the elections. These are some of the reasons we need to mop up as many policemen as possible,” he explained.
Saturday PUNCH however gathered from other sources that over 20,000 Special Protection Unit operatives of the force and riot policemen attached to prominent Nigerians would be recalled and deployed for election duties by police authorities.
Some security sources said the number of policemen that would be withdrawn might be as high as 35,000 because the Nigeria Police Force would play leading role in providing security during the elections.
“The Strategic Election Security Operational Plan is a big, complex operation requiring huge deployments; so, all hands must be on deck to ensure its success. The number of men to be recalled from private security duties could be huge, maybe as high as 35,000 or more,” a source stated.
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