By Hassan Zaggi
As part of plans to begin the full implementation of the Community Policing Initiative, the Federal Government has decentralized the Force Criminal Intelligence and Investigations Department (FCIID).
Apart from that, the Force Intelligence Bureau (FIB), has been given full autonomy. On the other hand, five additional Police Zonal Command Headquarters have been created.
The Force Spokesman, Frank Mba, disclosed this in a statement on Thursday.
The statement explained that by this development, “the FIB, which was previously a section under the FCIID, is now a full-fledged department of the Force to be headed by a Deputy Inspector-General of Police (DIG).
“With this new arrangement, the Nigeria Police Force now has 8 departments and each is headed by a DIG.”
On the decentralization of the FCIID, the statement said: “The Federal Government also approved the further decentralization of the FCID with the establishment of two additional offices in Enugu and Gombe States.
“While the office in Enugu is expected to take care of investigations of major crimes emanating from the South-East and South-South geo-political zones, the office in Gombe will take care of the North-East geo-political zone.”
The statement further explained that: “Each of these Annexes, in addition to the pre-existing ones in Lagos and Kaduna States, shall be headed by an Assistant Inspector-General of Police (AIG) who shall report to the DIG in-charge of the FCID, Force Headquarters, Abuja.”
Expatiating on the five news zonal commands, the statement said: “In a similar vein, 5 new Police Zonal Command Headquarters have been created for the Nigeria Police Force in addition to the hitherto existing 12 Zonal Command Headquarters.
“This makes a total of 17 Zonal Command Headquarters in the country. The 5 new Zonal Commands are: Akure (Ondo/Ekiti Commands), Awka (Enugu, Anambra, Ebonyi), Yenagoa (Bayelsa, Rivers Commands), Maiduguri (Yobe, Borno Commands) and Katsina (Katsina, Kaduna Commands).”
the statement quoted the Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Mohammed Adamu, as thanking President Muhammadu Buhari, for the approval.
He expressed optimism that the reorganization”will further bring policing closer to the people, improve the response time of the Police to incidents across the country and generally promote efficiency in service delivery.”
