Inspector General of Police, Suleiman Abba, has demonstrated precisely what is deplorable about the concentration of power in one individual or institution
With a wave of the hand, he removed the security personnel from the nation’s number four citizen, House of Representatives Speaker Aminu Tambuwal, on October 30, 2014 without giving any cogent reason for the constitutional travesty.
Then, with the same sleight of hand, he restored his security detail on Wednesday, March 11, 2015.
While his muscle-flexing arrogance lasted, the task fell on All Progressives Congress (APC) legislators to form amateur human shield around Tambuwal any time he had an official engagement outside his residence.
If anything qualifies as a symptom of bad governance, the arbitrary, illegal removal and restoration of the security detail, arrogating to himself the power of a competent court and law enforcer, is it. His action needlessly put Tambuwal in harm’s way for more than four months.
The Office of the Speaker deserves maximum respect, first because he is first among his 360 equal colleagues who honoured him with his election. No less important, he presides over legislators from all constituencies of the federation.
Abba was appointed by the president. Like all other security, intelligence and defence chiefs, he superintends over the entire federation. He is neither the IGP of the president nor the ruling party, the People Democratic Party (PDP).
Whatever his personal opinion about Tambuwal is his business. But until a competent court removes the Speaker from office or he is impeached by his colleagues, all his paraphernalia of office merit the constitutional respect which must be accorded him without any regard to the law enforcer’s personal prejudices.
The whole nation was shocked by the show of shame at the National Assembly (NASS) when, on November 20, 2014, the police blocked Tambuwal and other lawmakers from entering the premises to hold a special session to extend the emergency rule in three North Eastern states as requested by President Goodluck Jonathan.
Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Police Commissioner, Wilson Inalegwu, and his team shut the gate and blocked Tambuwal’s convoy from gaining access, compelling the Speaker’s aides and some lawmakers to scale the fence.
Six days later, Abba told a House investigating committee bluntly that Tambuwal no longer occupied his exalted seat as Speaker after defecting from the ruling PDP to the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Abba refused to elaborate, pleading the case was in court. In other words, he could second guess the court’s verdict and apply his interpretation.
The anger of the lawmakers was predictable. Few believed him when he said police deployed Inalegwu and his team which kept Tambuwal and his human shield of lawmakers and aides waiting for half an hour at the barricaded gate to prevent thugs from invading the premises.
Anything could have happened to Tambuwal while his professional security aides were lying fallow….
We concede that Nigeria’s security, intelligence, and defence forces operate on the hierarchical structure of the much-abused “order from above” which any officer disobeys at his expense with a mutiny charge thrown at him.
However, since Abba did not confirm that Jonathan ordered him to strip Tambuwal of his security aides, we can assume that it was his sole misinterpretation of the Constitution.
Abba has taken the first step to correct his personal constitutional toy-game of arbitrarily removing the security aides of Tambuwal by restoring them equally arbitrarily.
To close the file on the infamy, he must apologise to Tambuwal, not only for whimsically stripping him of his security detail, but also for impudently refusing to recognise his position.
Above all, Abba must tender an unreserved apology to all Nigerians for debasing the office of the number four citizen in a moment of puerile exuberance.