The House of Representatives has stripped the Police Service Commission recruitment and training powers and domiciled them with the Nigeria Police Force in a bill amending the Nigeria Police Act, which passed the third reading.
Governors have also been relieved their powers to issue order to commissioners of police in their respective states, while the Nigeria Police Council is now to meet twice in a year and during emergencies.
The PSC and the NPF had had a legal battle over who should recruit the 10,000 special constables approved by the President Muhammadu Buhari to strengthen the police due to rising spate of banditry, kidnappings, armed robbery and armed herdsmen attacks across the country.
The House had last Tuesday considered and adopted the report by the Committee on Police Affairs on the ‘Bill for an Act to Repeal the Police Act, Cap. P19, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004, and Enact Nigeria Police Act, 2020.’