A chieftain of the Nigerian Democratic Congress, NDC, Buba Galadima, on Tuesday accused President Bola Tinubu and state governors of trying to establish state police to use it as a tool of destruction in the 2027 general elections.
Galadima explained that state police would create more problems in the country.
Featuring on Arise Television’s Morning Show, Galadima wondered how state police would tackle security challenges if the Nigerian Army and police can’t.
He said: “Nobody ever conceived the idea of state police to sort out our security challenge, if the Nigerian police, the Nigerian military can’t solve the security situation in the country, I wonder how the state police would be able to do that.
“All that we know is that the President and governors are looking for state police before the election so that they use them as political thugs to attack the opposition, disarm the election, and kill democracy.
“I was adult enough to see what happened during the native authority police. When elections approached, three months to election, the native authority police will gather all opposition elements in their territorial jurisdiction and look them up. Some of them will say you have abused the emir, judge or you are wearing shoes when your village head was seated on the chair, then they would send all of them into detention.
“Most Hausa people that you see all over Nigeria and Africa where the spillover of the misuse of the native authority in Northern Nigeria and that is why they needed to run for their dear life and hide elsewhere.
“The state police can be used to destroy the unity of this country because there are certain states where only one tribe or religion would constitute the state police such that other people from the other parts of the country would have no liberty to do their business as enshrined by the constitution.
“The state police for me would create more problems and divisions.”
