Police authorities may not heed calls for scrapping of Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), it was learnt on Tuesday.

This was revealed by the Force Public Relations Officer, Mr Frank Mba, at Force Headquarters in Abuja, saying SARS cannot be scrapped because it is still needed to combat armed robbery and other violent crimes across the country.

Mba, a Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP), gave reasons for retaining the outfit during a live Instagram chat with popular Nigerian musician, Mr Azeez Fashola (aka Naira Marley).

The Force spokesman assured Nigerians that more will be done to monitor policemen to ensure the rights of citizens are not violated.

For the citizens to help police authorities to further sanitise the Force, Mba said: “But if a policeman is doing something wrong, you can take pictures and record videos and send them to us. But make sure you do so safely.

“If you feel in your interactions with the police that they are beginning to cross the line, you can take pictures and videos as long as it is safe for you to do so. When you send them to us, we will definitely follow up the matter and see it to a logical conclusion.”

Also, Lagos Police Commissioner, Mr Hakeem Odumosu on Tuesday banned the command’s SARS unit from detaining suspects in their cells.

Odumosu spoke on Channels Television morning programme, Sunrise Daily, where he advised residents on the appropriate actions taken to enforce the directives of IGP Adamu on SARS reforms.

“It is going to be different because there will be more monitoring and supervision. The additional directive I gave yesterday (Monday) is that they must not even go to investigate any case without booking their arrival at the Area Commander’s office so that the Area Commander will know that they are in that area doing what they ought to do. Once they finish, they must go back and file entry.

“Secondly, I gave a directive that they must not detain anybody in their cells any longer. They can only detain at my office or at the Area Commander’s office. And the Area Commander must interview any suspect they want to detain and ascertain that the suspect had done what warranted being detained,” he said.

Amnesty International (AI) on Tuesday offered tips on how Nigeria can reform SARS.

AI said the key to reforming the police unit is to empower oversight bodies, including Police Service Commission (PSC), Committee Against Torture and the National Human Rights Commission.

These bodies, it explained, would investigate and initiate prosecution of police officers involved in human rights violations.

In a statement, AI accused Nigerian of failing to show “a genuine commitment to ending” the problem, adding that without such actions, the menace would persist.

The Nation