A former Deputy President of the Senate, Ike Ekweremadu, has raised the alarm over the looming danger with the proliferation of security outfits and vigilante groups without regulation by the Federal Government.
Ekweremadu, in an interview with our correspondent, stated that while he had always advocated for the establishment of policing systems at the state level, arming people to protect lives and property without government regulation portends danger for the polity.
He said, “Under the Firearms Act, only the President can permit you to carry arms and he also determines what level of arms that you can carry, otherwise carrying arms by anybody is completely forbidden. But now, you see people carry arms and sometimes they abuse the use of these arms; sometimes they go and fire at people who are assembling freely. So, these are some of the fears that people are having, and this can get worse.
“But my answer to this is that you cannot talk about decentralised policing without a regulation; it has to be regulated. Today, we have a state judiciary, and the judiciary has the power of life and death but it has not been abused simply because it is being regulated under the Constitution. So, if we are going to police this country effectively, we must have decentralised police that is regulated. That is the caveat.”
