…calls for ease of curfew in Delta
Committee for the Defence of Human Rights (CDHR) on Thursday applauded the Delta State House of Assembly for allowing the Delta Community Security Corps Agency bill pass through the second reading in the house.
The group said if the bill is finally passed into law, it will help in maintaining law and order in the state and for other related purposes.
Vice President of the group, Prince Keinde Taiga, who gave this commendation during an interview with Vanguard in Warri, however appealed to the state Governor, Senator Dr Ifeanyi Okowa not to play politics with the agency when it finally comes on stream.
He said the leadership and membership of the local security agency should comprise qualified individuals from all parts of the state irrespective of party affiliations.
He said, “I want to commend the Delta State House of Assembly for allowing the Delta Community Security Corps Agency pass through the second reading in the house. We believe that this Agency if passed into law will help strengthen the security apparatus of this state.
“What I want to stress here is that we don’t want this security outfit to be politicized. The constitution of the security outfit should cut across the state.
“The governor must look beyond politics and ensure that people who are qualified get the job. We don’t want those that will head the agency to be politicians.
“The police as we know, has been politicized and that is why we are having the problems that we are having today in the police.”
Taiga, who was the immediate past Chairman of CDHR, Delta Chapter, also appealed to Governor Okowa to ease the COVID-19 lockdown, saying that the level of poverty in the state has reached an alarming rate.
“We have had a lot of complains from the public that police is feeding fat from the COVID-19 curfew. They arrest people without charging them to Court. They collect huge sums of money from the people. Sometimes they charge as high as 30000 for bail.
“We want to appeal to the governor of the state to relax the curfew so that those who are surviving on night business should be allowed to do their businesses because the level of poverty in the state is very high.
“People living around Udu council area and other parts of the state are complaining seriously about the level of insecurity in their areas, yet the police is busy raiding these areas everyday and collecting huge sums of money from them,” Taiga noted.
