Responding to recent questions regarding the indiscriminate checkpoints across the country that disrupt the flow of traffic and encourage extortion and other inappropriate behaviours by police officers, the acting Inspector-General of Police, Olukayode Egbetokun, stated that the Nigeria Police Force cannot vacate the checkpoints.
Undoubtedly, the Nigeria Police are widely empowered under the Police Act to maintain public safety and public order as they may deem necessary. In fact, the Inspector-General of Police is also empowered under the Act to establish rules and regulations that facilitate the functions of the Police. Specifically, police checks serve a variety of purposes, one of which is to deter criminals from engaging in criminal activities.
Instances of police officers at checkpoints abusing their power and extorting money from innocent motorists are commonplace across the country. In the course of extorting money from innocent motorists queuing up at the checkpoints, the police recklessly use wedges and broken woods to narrow down the width of the expressways, causing incredible vehicular jams along the expressways.
To start with, the number of checkpoints littering our country’s expressways is excessive and must be reduced. For instance, the Lagos-Onitsha Expressway is encumbered with about 60 checkpoints, such that every three to five minutes of driving, approximately 200 meters, the vehicle slows down due to traffic logjams caused by police, military, or customs checkpoints.