By Christiana Ekpa
The Minister of Police Affairs, Maigari Dingyadi, on Tuesday revealed that
a new salary scale for the Nigeria Police would soon commence as the Salaries and National Salaries, Incomes and Wages Commission has submitted the proposal for an upward review.
Maigari Dingyadi, made this known when he appeared before the Joint National Assembly Committee on Police Affairs led by Haliru Jika (Senate) and Usman Kumo (House of Representatives).
He said “In recognition of the take home pay of the police, which necessitated the need to motivate them for better performance, Mr President directed the Salaries and Wages Commission to work out a new salary package for the Nigerian Police and submit it to the government for consideration.
“In keeping with this directive, the Commission in consultation with the relevant stakeholders have submitted a proposal to the government which is being given the desired and urgent attention,” Dingyadi said.
Dingyadi also said the Ministry is aware of discussions that are ongoing on the need to exit the Police Contributory Pension Scheme, even though he did not make a definite statement on their position on the matter.
He said the year under review started in the midst of challenges such as the effect of ENDSARS protests, and COVID 19, which “inflicted serious social, moral, economic and security setbacks for the police.”
According to him, the situation was further compounded by the myriad of security challenges such as terrorism, armed banditry, kidnapping for ransome, armed robbery and secessionist agitations cutting across all the six geo-political zones of the country.
He said in spite of these challenges the Ministry of Police Affairs had remained focused and extended all necessary requests of support to the Nigeria Police in the fight against this criminality.
Among the successes of the Ministry, he said, was the implementation of the community policing programme, which saw training and deployment of 25, 000 special constabularies to their local government areas of origin to aid policing.
Also Commandant, Nigeria Police Academy, Wudil, Kano, AIG Lawan Jimeta, who appeared before the joint committee lamented manpower shortages in both the academic and administrative wings of the academy.
“The academy is grossly understaffed as many academic programmes are being run without adequate lecturers. Also the administration and other operations are also in dire need of manpower. Efforts to get employment waivers from the head of service of the federation is yet to yield desired results,” he said.
The academy he said has a cadet strength presently of over 3,300 cadets and they are expected to be provided with qualitative education, conducive accommodation, three meals a day and combat training facilities among others.
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