By
Nze David N. Ugwu
Few public policy issues in Nigeria have lingered as long—or generated as much heat with so little resolution—as the debate over State Police. For more than twenty years, the idea has resurfaced whenever insecurity worsens, only to retreat again under the weight of fear, suspicion, and political mistrust. What should ordinarily be a technical conversation about security architecture has become a deeper national argument about power, maturity, and the limits of decentralization in a fragile federation.
Today, that debate can no longer be postponed. Nigeria is facing a scale and complexity of insecurity that the current centralized policing model is evidently unable to manage. From terrorism and banditry to kidnapping, communal violence, and organized crime, the threats are local, adaptive, and deeply embedded in community realities. Yet our response remains rigidly centralized, slow, and disconnected from the very spaces where crime occurs. The question, therefore, is no longer whether State Police is desirable in theory, but whether Nigeria can afford to continue without it in practice.
Policing Is Local—Crime Always Has Been
Policing, by its very nature, is a grassroots function. Crime does not occur in abstractions; it occurs in streets, villages, markets, forests, and highways. Effective policing depends on local intelligence, cultural familiarity, linguistic competence, and trust between law enforcement and the community. These are elements that cannot be efficiently managed from a distant central command.
In many advanced societies, this reality is reflected in their policing structures. In most advanced societies, policing is organized around local forces accountable to local authorities, even though national standards and oversight exist. In some less advanced societies too, law enforcement is overwhelmingly decentralized, with thousands of municipal, county, and state police agencies operating alongside federal bodies. These systems are not perfect, and abuses occur, but they are constrained by strong institutions, independent courts, professional norms, and robust civic oversight.
Nigeria, by contrast, operates one of the most centralized police systems in the world. A single national police force is expected to secure a country of over 200 million people, across vast and diverse territories, with limited manpower, poor welfare, weak morale, and chronic resource shortages. The result is predictable: delayed responses, poor intelligence, low public trust, and widespread inefficiency.
The Case for State Police: Logic and Necessity
The arguments in favor of State Police are neither radical nor novel. First is responsiveness. State governments are closer to the people and better positioned to understand local security challenges. A State Police force would be more familiar with terrain, social networks, and emerging threats. Second is speed. Decentralized command structures allow for quicker decision-making and faster deployment, especially in emergencies. Third is accountability. In principle, a police force embedded within a state’s political and social ecosystem should be more answerable to local populations than one primarily accountable to federal headquarters.
There is also a constitutional dimension. Nigeria describes itself as a federation, yet retains a unitary approach to coercive power. True federalism implies shared authority, including some measure of control over internal security. Without this, states remain administrators rather than autonomous units capable of protecting their citizens. The contradiction weakens both governance and public confidence in the state’s capacity to provide security.
Given the scale of Nigeria’s security crisis, continuing to rely exclusively on a centralized police force increasingly appears not only inefficient but irresponsible.
The Fear That Will Not Go Away
And yet, opposition to State Police remains intense. Critics argue that Nigeria’s political environment is too toxic, too personalized, and too authoritarian at the subnational level to entrust governors with control over armed forces. They fear that State Police would be weaponized against political opponents, protesters, journalists, labor unions, and civil society organizations. In this view, State Police would become private armies of governors rather than instruments of public safety.
These fears are not imaginary. Nigeria’s history offers ample evidence of executive overreach, compromised institutions, and the abuse of power. Governors already exert enormous influence over state assemblies, electoral processes, and local government structures. Introducing State Police into such an environment raises legitimate concerns about repression, selective enforcement, and the erosion of civil liberties.
But here lies the paradox: Nigeria already suffers from police abuse under a centralized system. Federal control has not insulated citizens from brutality, corruption, extortion, or political interference. The problem, therefore, is not simply where power is located, but how it is constrained.
Maturity Is Not the Absence of Power
The most common objection to State Police is that Nigeria—or its states—are “not mature enough” for such a system. This argument, while emotionally appealing, deserves closer examination. Nations do not become mature by avoiding responsibility; they become mature by building institutions capable of managing power responsibly.
If maturity were a prerequisite for reform, Nigeria would never reform anything. Our democracy itself was born imperfect. Federalism was adopted amid deep mistrust. Yet progress has occurred, unevenly and painfully, through trial, error, and institutional learning. To argue that Nigeria must first become mature before decentralizing policing is to postpone reform indefinitely.
Moreover, centralization has not produced maturity. It has produced distance, opacity, and inefficiency. Power that is too concentrated is not safer; it is simply farther away from scrutiny.
The Real Issue: Institutions, Not Structure
At its core, the State Police debate is not about structure but about institutions. Where institutions are strong, power—whether centralized or decentralized—is constrained. Where institutions are weak, power becomes predatory regardless of where it is located.
Nigeria’s challenge is not that State Police would be abused; it is that abuse is already normalized across multiple institutions. The solution is not to freeze governance structures in place, but to redesign them with stronger safeguards.
If State Police is to work, it must be introduced alongside robust accountability mechanisms. These include independent state police service commissions insulated from executive interference, clear constitutional limits on police powers, strong judicial oversight, enforceable human rights protections, and transparent funding arrangements. Recruitment must be merit-based and professional, not ethnic or partisan. Citizens must have real avenues for redress when abuses occur.
Crucially, State Police should not exist in isolation. Nigeria needs a layered security architecture in which federal, state, and local forces coexist, cooperate, and restrain one another. No single level of government should enjoy a monopoly over coercive force.
Insecurity as the Cost of Inaction
The greatest danger in the State Police debate is not reform gone wrong, but reform endlessly delayed. Insecurity has real costs: lives lost, communities displaced, economies disrupted, and trust eroded. Each year of inaction deepens the sense that the state—at all levels—cannot protect its citizens.
Already, informal and quasi-legal security arrangements are proliferating. Vigilante groups, community militias, and regional security outfits have emerged to fill the vacuum left by an overstretched police force. While these arrangements may provide temporary relief, they also carry risks of abuse, fragmentation, and conflict if left unregulated. The longer Nigeria avoids formal reform, the more it risks losing control over its own security landscape.
Choosing Responsibility Over Fear
Ultimately, the State Police debate is a test of Nigeria’s willingness to confront its own contradictions. We cannot simultaneously demand security and resist the reforms required to deliver it. We cannot insist on federalism while centralizing coercive power. And we cannot claim to fear abuse while tolerating the abuses already embedded in the status quo.
State Police is not a silver bullet. It will not magically end insecurity or cure Nigeria’s governance problems. But neither is it the apocalypse some fear. It is a policy tool—one that can either deepen dysfunction or improve security, depending on how it is designed and governed.
The real question is not whether State Police should exist, but whether Nigeria is prepared to build the institutions that make power serve the people rather than dominate them. Avoiding reform out of fear may feel safe, but it comes at a growing cost. In a country as diverse, populous, and complex as Nigeria, clinging to centralized failure is no longer a viable option.
Nze David N. Ugwu is the Managing Consultant of Knowledge Research Consult. He could be reached at [email protected] or +2348037269333.
