*GROUP LAUDS GOVERNOR ALEX OTTI AND CP KENECHUKWU ONWUEMELIE ON RESTORING SANITY AT BENDE ROAD UMUAHIA* .
Umuahia, Abia State.
A registered good governance oriented group known as Network for Advocacy and Good Leadership Initiative (NAGLI) has applauded the performing Governor of Abia State, Dr. Alex Chioma Otti and the new Commissioner of Police, CP Kenechukwu Onwuemelie for dismantling the shameful road blocks in front of the Commissioner’s office and the one by CPS on same Bende Road.
In a release signed by the Director General of NAGLI, Mazi Dr. Agodi Kanu, the group recalled that several efforts were made to get Governor Ikpeazu’s regime and successive Commisioners to dismantle the checkpoints that had outlived its usefulness. He regretted that, against the purpose of installing the check point, the police men on duty have converted the exercise to daily revenue transactions without shame. This he said has eroded the confidence of the citizens on the Police.
The Director of the group narrated a sad experience of a primary school child who passes the road with his mother and siblings on tricycle he shockingly told the mum that when he grows up he will like to be a police officer so as to be collecting money from tricycle riders and giving her. Though the mother reprimanded him, but the damage was already done to his psyche and mentality as to who a policeman is.
Mazi Kanu further stated that such professional ineptitude is one of the reasons Community Policing cannot thrive and called for complete change and reorientation of the Force to regain the trust of the citizens, to be participants in the security value chain in Nigeria.
He appreciated Governor Otti for putting an end to the cries of the people and the Commissioner of Police for being strategic and responsive in removing the roadblocks and ending the extortion.
Recall that one side of Bende Road, Umuahia in front of the CP office and CPS was blocked at the peak of the unknown gunmen activities in Abia State. The citizen’s concern wasn’t the roadblocks but the brazen extortion of money by various teams from keke and commercial bus drivers without paying attention to the core police duties of protection of lives and property.
