By Bulus Y. Atsen Esq.
“Peace is costly, but it is worth the expense,” goes an African proverb. But in today’s Nigeria, one must ask: at whose expense?
Increasingly, victims and not the state bear the cost of securing public justice. Transporting officers to crime scenes, fueling patrol vans, printing documents—these are now routine expenses expected of complainants. This silent, unofficial shift has turned many victims into unwilling financiers of public policing.
This disturbing norm has taken root despite a consistent rise in the Nigeria Police Force’s annual budget, from ₦455 billion in 2021 to ₦969.6 billion in 2024. Yet, at the divisional level where policing happens in real time, officers still grapple with empty fuel tanks, broken-down vehicles and a lack of basic supplies. The disconnect between appropriation and delivery could not be more glaring.
Justice for Sale: Implications of Victim-Funded Policing
The consequences of victim-funded policing in Nigeria are both practical and psychological. They include:
- Justice for the Rich Only: When investigations hinge on a victim’s ability to pay, the scales of justice tilt towards the wealthy. Poor Nigerians, unable to fund investigations, often watch their cases fade into bureaucratic oblivion.
- Loss of Public Trust: Policing is a public good, not a commodity. When victims are made to pay, citizens stop seeing the police as impartial protectors. Trust erodes. Apathy grows and the cycle of insecurity deepens.
- Rise in Jungle Justice: With weakened faith in the system, communities take matters into their own hands. Mob justice—a crude and dangerous substitute—fills the void, often punishing the innocent based on suspicion rather than proven fact.
- Corruption Becomes Institutionalised: When unofficial payments become the norm, they stop being seen as corruption. Instead, they are absorbed into daily practice. Officers who wish to serve ethically are demoralised, hemmed in by a system that expects them to improvise with nothing.
A Force Weakened by History
It must be said—and often overlooked—that the Nigeria Police Force consists of good men and women. Many joined to serve, protect and uphold the rule of law. However, their resolve and capacity have been systematically eroded, not just by underfunding but by deliberate institutional weakening from colonialism, cascading down to decades of military rule.
Under successive military regimes, the Police lost ground. Functions traditionally performed by police, including internal security, investigations and intelligence, were co-opted or sidelined. Budgets shrank. Training collapsed. Authority undermined. By the time democracy returned in 1999, the Police Force had been reduced to a shadow of its potential—under-resourced, over-centralised and stripped of operational autonomy.
Fragmentation of Police Powers: A House Divided
The democratic era was ushered in by and also brought an explosion of new agencies performing core police functions: EFCC (financial crimes), NDLEA (drug enforcement), ICPC (corruption), NSCDC (infrastructure protection), NAPTIP (human trafficking) and more. While some of these agencies have performed admirably, the result has been fragmentation and duplication, not synergy.
These agencies function independently of the Police, often with better funding, equipment and training. Yet all of them essentially exercise police powers: investigation, arrest, detention and prosecution.
Rather than reinventing the wheel with every emerging security challenge, Nigeria should consider reintegrating these agencies as specialised directorates within a reformed Nigeria Police Force. This would unify command, streamline training, eliminate duplication and ensure that the Police regains its central role in law enforcement. The EFCC, for example, could become the Financial Crimes Directorate of the Nigeria Police Force. The NDLEA could be the Drug Enforcement Bureau. Each retains its operational autonomy but under a unified, professional and accountable structure.
The Nigeria Police Trust Fund: Hope or Illusion?
In 2019, the Federal Government introduced the Nigeria Police Trust Fund (NPTF)—a statutory body designed to supplement funding for police training, equipment acquisition and operations. It draws revenue from federal allocations, private sector contributions and levies on companies.
On paper, the NPTF should have transformed the police. But years later, complaints persist. Stations remain poorly equipped and divisional officers still rely on victims to fund routine tasks. Transparency in fund disbursement is lacking and there is little public accountability.
The Way Forward—or Backwards?
The rise in police budgets has not translated into greater operational capacity and public safety. This suggests a deeper issue: not just underfunding, but misallocation and misapplication of resources. Year after year, the Office of the Auditor General of the Federation audits police spending, yet the deficits at the grassroots remain unchanged.
To address this, I herein propose the following:
- Create a Special Operational Account: Each police division should be specifically allocated economically realistic funds for investigations, visible policing and administration.
- Mandate Transparent Oversight: A multi-stakeholder team comprising the Police Service Commission, National Human Rights Commission, Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), Office of the Accountant General, and Nigerian Bar Association should oversee the disbursement and monitor monthly usage.
- Ban Informal Payments: A clear, enforceable policy must prohibit officers from seeking funds from victims for core policing duties.
- Reintegrate Fragmented Agencies: All agencies exercising police powers should be structurally integrated into the Nigeria Police Force as specialised directorates to enhance efficiency, synergy and accountability.
- Establish State Police Services: Nigeria is too large and diverse to rely on a single, centralised police model. State policing—where each state establishes its force tailored to local realities—is not just desirable, it is overdue.
The National Assembly’s Role
The planned Security Summit by the National Assembly, if it ever holds, must prioritise the funding of divisional police stations. It is a national disgrace that some lawmakers spend more per week fueling their convoys than an entire police division receives in a year as imprest—a paltry N180,000.
Beyond budgeting, the National Assembly must urgently fast-track constitutional reforms to legalise and regulate state policing. Without decentralisation and effective accountability, no amount of federal funding or trust funds will sustainably solve our policing crisis.
Policing is a public service. It cannot remain the privilege of the wealthy. If the state will not fund justice for all, it has tacitly privatised it.
Conclusion
The Nigeria Police Force is not beyond redemption. It is staffed by capable officers, undermined by poor systems and fragmented by decades of military-era marginalisation and policy missteps. To fix it, we must think beyond mere patchwork reforms.
We need a bold reimagining of law enforcement in Nigeria, backed by proper funding, operational accountability, structural reintegration and constitutional recognition of state policing. If we do not act now, every citizen walking into a police station tomorrow may still be asked the same question: Do you want justice, or can you afford it?
Bulus Y. Atsen, fsi, is a legal practitioner, former Chairman of the Nigerian Bar Association (Abuja Branch) and a Fellow of the Security Institute. He can be reached via byatsen01@gmail.com
The views expressed by contributors are strictly personal and not of Law & Society Magazine.
