By : Ing. Yayah A. B. Conteh.
Like any other police force in the world, the Sierra Leone police force is tasked with the responsibility of ensuring internal security and protecting life and property, detecting and preventing crime and enhancing access to justice.
One might be tempted to ask how effective has the Sierra Leone police been in the execution of their duties, or have they just been branded as a trigger-happy police force in combatting crime and security threats nationwide?
Impunity for police abuses remains deeply entrenched in such a scale majority of the people no longer trust the police force as clearly highlighted in a recent survey. By their actions, the police have been branded as the most corrupt institution in the country, a damaging allegation to the institution and is up to the police to rebrand its dented image.
The increased rate of crime in the country seems to accelerate at an alarming rate, evident from robbery attacks, 419 fraudsters, murders, rape and abuse of women and girls as well as intermittent ritual killings.
Corruption is also a major challenge confronting the police, and it is everywhere in government ministries, agencies and departments. Even the youth who are expected to inherit the mantle of leadership have been corrupted in one form or another raising fear about what tomorrow would look like.
It is quite unthinkable to leave out the police force in a country in which corruption is a way of life. New corrupt practices are unearthed as each day passes by, despite government’s effort to curb the practice through the Anti-Corruption Commission.
The police have been accused of demanding bribes on several occasions. Just to extort money from innocent individuals, the police have been found culpable of issues related to unlawful arrest and detention to threats and acts of violence especially torture.
Thus, police corruption wastes resources, undermines security, makes a mockery of justice and decelerates economic development not to talk of alienating a large proportion of the population from their governments.
Go around today and see numerous roadblocks mounted at various points across the length and breadth of the country. Sad to say that the era of roadblocks has brought in more damage than salvation we can ever imagine.
Policemen now capitalise on them as a means to cleverly request money from drivers and non-drivers alike travelling around the country on daily basis. Massive corruption are underway at checkpoints like those at Mile 38, Yonibana junction and another prior to entering the city of Bo, to name but just a few, where palms of officers are greased from time to time by drivers in particular in order to enable them have a way through the checkpoints.
At some road blocks, officers demand that passengers alight from the vehicle and walk in a file through the checkpoint whilst their luggages are being searched, either for possession of Kush or marijuana, drugs, illegal arms and ammunition.
These are all just formality measures on the part of these officers, because as soon as money is exchanged between drivers and officers- at-command post (sometimes done by secretly dropping the money by the side of a passing vehicle, or taken inside the police booth assigned for settling scores between officers and defaulters), the search immediately ceases and the vehicle given the Green light to proceed ahead.
There are times when drivers of vehicles no longer dismount from their seats to the police booths as the rules and regulations demand; rather, they simply remain seated in their comfortable seats and drop off the agreed amount of money on the highway itself for the attention of the officers, whilst the very vehicle still continues in motion before disappearing into the distance.
Instances abound of police officers pitching up tent with hard core criminals to unleash mayhem in society. Theft cases have been exposed in some communities where police officers are involved too, thus demeaning the integrity of the ‘Force for Good’.
Drivers who are said to operate vehicles and other pieces of equipment believed to be the property of high ranking officers in the country have been caught on several occasions going against the law, sometimes even getting involved in fatal accidents, or conveying harmful unauthorised drugs for which no stringent penalties are instituted.
This would have been quite the opposite had the crime been committed by a civilian. Shall we say at this point that to every rule, there is an exception, even at the very detriment of citizens and country?
What a shame that a ‘Force for Good’ can indulge in such practices as highlighted above and still claims to maintain that degree of professionalism devoid of trust and promise for the advancement of the nation at large.
Reports especially the Truth and Reconciliation, 2004 indicated that before the civil war of the 90s, the Sierra Leone police was a corrupt and tribalised instrument of state oppression. Its effects seemingly disrupted formal policing, reducing the number of personnel to an appreciably low number.
Thanks to community policing which was begun after the war, and which fundamentally aims at enabling the community’s voice to be heard in how they are policed.
It is disheartening to say here that men who are expected to protect the nation and its citizens are seen to depict a negative image of the force for good, thus robbing them of the respect they otherwise would have commanded. The recruitment and training of officers in the police force leaves a lot to be desired these days in both past and present governments especially with politics and tribalism polarising the appointments and promotions of these personnel.
Modern day recruitment is more about connections thereby neglecting the able-bodied and more willing ones to get into the system and letting in the non-capable ones instead hence ensuring continued bad policing.
There is every need for retraining of officers in the police force including a thorough scrutiny of officers as well as recruits.
Each category of police officers, be they local council police, traffic police or other, should not regard their posts as meal tickets; rather, their aims and objectives should be to serve the citizens and country at all times, and to the best of their abilities.
Ing. Yayah A. B. Conteh is the former Director of the Mechanical Services Department (MSD) of the Sierra Leone Roads Authority (SLRA).
Tel. nos : 076640364 / 077718805.
E-mail : contehyayahab2020@gmail.com.