2023: Police Train Officers On Election Security

As the nation prepares for the 2023 general elections, the Nigeria Police Force (NPF), yesterday, convened an election security management workshop to educate police personnel, the military, paramilitary and the public on their duties before, during and after the elections.

The event, which took place at the International Conference Center, Abuja, had top serving military and police officers, former IGPs, the paramilitary, media executives in attendance.

The inspector-general of police, IGP Usman Baba said about 400 trainees drawn from different security agencies will undergo the training in Abuja and in the six geo-political zones across the country.

He said: “Election security governance is critical to the advancement of democratic culture across the free world. In Nigeria, by virtue of the Electoral Act 2022 (As amended), the Nigeria Police Force is the lead agency in the election security process. The Force is, however, complemented by the Military, Intelligence community, and other security and safety agencies. The import of this is that the success of every election is determined not just by the strength of the legal framework regulating the course, but by a few other key variables.

“Over the years, there have been questions on the professional capacity of the Nigeria Police and other security agencies in relation to the performance of their election security mandate. In addressing these concerns, efforts have been consistently made by the office of the National Security Adviser, Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC and successive leaderships of the Nigeria Police and these have translated into improved election security operations by the Nigeria Police as evidenced by our widely commended performances during the 2019 General Elections and recent off-season elections in Edo, Anambra, Ondo, Ekiti and Osun States.

“Mindful of its critical role in the election security value chain, and conscious of the need to continually broaden its professional knowledge and operational capacity with a view to closing the knowledge gap that could inhibit the optimal delivery of our election security mandate the leadership of the Nigeria Police found it expedient to expose personnel to tailor-made training ahead of the 2023 General Elections. This informed the concept of this Workshop.

“This initiative which is being delivered under the theme – ‘The 2023 General Elections: Enhancing National Security Capacity for a Secure and Credible Electoral Process in Nigeria’ is part of the broad action plans of the Force leadership to prepare Police personnel for the general elections in 2023.

It is a Train-the-Trainer Workshop in which participating officers will be supported to transfer the knowledge to be acquired to wider sets of personnel in their Areas of Jurisdiction.