 Following the recommendation of Police Boss Usman Baba, the Police Service Commission suspends Abba Kiari and Southwest Governors propose Supreme Court for geopolitical zones. This is Plus Politics and I am Mary Annacolm. The Police Service Commission has suspended Abba Kiari from office. Inspector General of Police Usman Baba recommended the suspension as a temporary measure while the police investigate Kiari's relationship with the popular fraudster Raymond Abbas, popularly known as Hush Poppy. Kiari was indicted by a US court as a conspirator in a $1.1 million fraudulent deal against Qatari businessman to be tried in the US as requested by the American court. Kiari would have to be extradited by Nigeria or voluntarily travel to face the trial. He has, however, denied any wrongdoing. We are going to break this down so joining us to discuss this is Dr Ben O'Kizyeh. He is a security analyst and of course a security columnist with the Sun newspaper. And we are also being joined by Mr Ken Robinson and he is of Panda. Thank you very much gentlemen for joining us. Thank you for having me here again and good evening Nigeria, good evening Plus TV. Good evening. Like I said, Ben O'Kizyeh is not a doctor. Okay. All right. So I'm going to start with you Mr O'Kizyeh because you are a security analyst and there are so many questions surrounding this whole indictment. The fact that a man who was one time super cop who everybody celebrated all of a sudden is being entangled in this criminal case and now the FBI is asking that he be extradited to the US. My first question is obviously why do you think he took the police so long to respond because everybody was hoping that the police would speak up immediately that report hit Nigeria but it took a long time and then the police responded by suspending him. Just suspension. Is this a way of the police trying to separate itself from what the FBI is investigating? No, I don't think so. I strongly believe that the police is not an institution that you turn into taking action Oh, I think we're having connection issues. Unfortunately, I don't think the police, what they did was to put it on social media and from social media everybody got the awareness and that is as it means to police have to really study and then verify the authenticity of the report before they can start taking a decision and then knowing that fully whether the personality that we are talking about is one that has sacrificed a lot both for the police and for the nation. So it's not something you just start believing that such a thing has happened. So I'm sure the police took that time just to seriously verify and then before they took action and the action they took has been appreciated and applauded by many. At least we have seen that there's integrity in place by the inspectorial police and that they want to do all that the police ought to do. I don't think they're trying in any way to cover up Abercarie. Yes, Abercarie is like a belong song because he has done a lot for the police and he's gotten a lot of honours from both the president, from national assembly, from various departments for the type of work that he has really done by rescuing people from the den of kidnappers. So it's not that the FBI sent such a damaging report on him, it's something that will have been a shock. It's just like a father who came back from work and saw so many people and then they are telling him that your son was found involved in a criminal act which he never believed and unfortunately the first thing he will do is to draw the son into his house and question that son before taking any other step and that's why we applauded the inspectorial police about what he has done is commendable and that's the right step to the taking. Mr Robinson, you heard Mr Kiari, I mean we all read his explanation as to the only connection he had with the said hush puppy. What did you make of that explanation? Of course he has also said that he's being clad of wrongdoing, rather he's saying that he has done anything wrong, he's saying that he has no idea as to a 1.1 million dollar, he explained about some tailoring business and some materials but what do you make of that explanation? The explanation is a bit wishy-washy and I think that speaking for a spokesman of PANDEF my personal opinions are very limited, whatever I say would be considered that I'm speaking for PANDEF. The fact of the matter is that PANDEF believes that the position of the police service commission and of course the inspector general of police is appropriate, there is commendable they need to prove to the world that Nigeria is a serious country, we do not tolerate corrupt practices and of course Buhari, President Buhari has prided himself as one of his achievements according to the government is the fight against corruption. So this is a test case for the government and of course for the police, Nigeria police and so we commend the position taken by the police service commission and of course the special general of police and we will advise Abakari, you know since he says he is innocent the United States judicial system is trustworthy, there has been a lot of proof and integrity about the judicial in the US of the United States, if he is innocent definitely he should go there and declare himself, not just for himself, for his family but also for the country and integrity of Nigerian police first, it's important that he goes, he should go by himself, he should not even wait to be sent there by the Nigerian government to expedite it, he should voluntarily go to the US and declare himself of all the allegations against, because the allegations are waiting and it could not just be written off just like that by a post on social media or whatever. Yes, now there have been also reactions that have trailed the justification of the invitation by the FBI was the police service commission saying that the FBI has no right whatsoever to order an arrest of a Nigerian and I'm wondering what's your reaction to that because they seem to be saying you shouldn't, you know the FBI shouldn't be ordering for us to extradite one of ours and that's what the police service commission had to say about that order, but you are on the other hand saying that if Abba Kiari is saying that he's guilt free then he should go there and prove his, he's, you know, innocent. So this seems like speaking from both sides of the mouse, the police has suspended Abba Kiari but then they're saying that the FBI has no right. Well, they need to understand that this is, it has an international dimension. It's an international crime. It's a dent on the, on the, on the fight, touted fight against corruption by Mr. President and the everything about integrity of the administration and the Nigerian police. So the police service commission should not, through all those issues, the crime was committed, I believe not in Nigeria. And so it's an international crime and FBI have I'm sure that we are told reported that there are several meetings with his general police and then I'm sure that all those meetings, the outcome of those meetings is what we're seeing now, the suspension of Abba Kiari. But Nigeria needs to be serious about these issues and that the FBI has no right to be asking for someone to be sent from Nigeria. It's out of place because Nigeria went to Kenya to arrest Inam De Kano and Nigeria is asking for Sunday road to be exorbitant back to Nigeria. OK, back to you, Mr. Casey, I'm still going to push you on this issue because you are more of a security person. If the police service commission is saying in one breath that the FBI has no right, they have no jurisdiction to ask for one of us to be extradited to the US. And then in the same breath have suspended the same said person from office, pending the investigations. Is this not some form of signals? No, I'm asking Mr. Casey this question because I want to hear his thoughts. Yeah, thank you very much. Inasmuch as we see the report from the FBI has been damaging. That does not mean that we should Nigeria should hit everything they have said. Nigeria is a sovereign country. America is a sovereign country. This crime was according to the report perpetrated in Nigeria. The guy in question Abbas is a Nigerian. So if they arrested him in Dubai and they would seem a way to US already Abbas lawyer had already complained on the way the FBI which Abbas away from Dubai when he was talking on a BBC program. What I will be saying is that if the FBI truly know that the information they have or the reports they have or the documents they have are very, very short. Let them send their men to Nigeria to come and the Nigerians should give them a platform where they can sit down and interrogate Abbas. Why should he be interrogated? I'm sorry. Hold on, sir. Why should he be interrogated? No, no, no, I'm curious and I want to ask this question. Why should he be interrogated on our own terms? He committed or he's being indicted on international crimes. International laws immediately have to apply in this instance. So why would they want to come here and interrogate him if he is needed? The international law, the ESPIS, the international law. Also, there is a department, there is an institution in Nigeria that handles that same international law. That is the EFCC. That we are talking of money laundering. EFCC handles that. And EFCC is well-recognized by the international body, organizations, they contact EFCC for information, for everything. So there's nothing wrong with that. Moreover, just recently, this... How trusted is the EFCC in terms of dealing with financial crimes? What is the track record of the EFCC in terms of dealing with international crimes? We're able to trust our EFCC because EFCC have jailed so many governors, many ministers for corrupt practices. They are already languishing in jail right now. Just like I was saying, just recently, the same America sent the Marine. And the Marine got in touch with the Nigerian Army to rescue one of the Americans that was kidnapped and brought into Nigerian soil. And the joint effort was successful. And the guy was rescued and back to the U.S. So if a crime was committed in Dubai or in the Middle East and they are being tried, why can't the Nigerian police give that support, collaborate with the U.S. and allow their men to be in the U.S., maybe supported by some officers and men, to make sure that that particular investigation goes as it should, instead of saying that the U.S. or the FBI has no right to ask for an extradition. If we have had the U.S. come to our soil and collaborated with our people to solve a crime, why can't we do the same? Are we saying that we do not trust the FBI? Is that what you're incinerating? You see, the case in question has to do with a top secret officer. And thank God it's... Does it mean that because he's a top police officer, he's above the law? No, not at all. So why are we giving him a different kind of priority? Till the top... Amun was to be extradited. But what I'm saying is that for the fact that the case we are talking about has to do with an allegation. It's an allegation. It's still an allegation. And because it's an allegation, they should wait. Let the Nigerian police do their own internal screening of the police officer. Meanwhile, they have already taken a rightful step by suspending him. Suspension is almost like the first part of punishment to say that they are not impressed with what they are hearing. So they have suspended him and now they have set up a panel of ATIG in charge of the third highest criminal investigation team. I mean, the institution department in Nigeria, police. So another interesting thing to make sure that this thing is very, very complete. The person in charge of the case, of the who is going to do the interrogation is not an outside man. So there's no ethnic affinity and there's no religious affinity. Nobody brought that... I don't think anybody brought that as a concern. In any way, that is not a concern. No, I mean, so that people will know that there's not going to be like anything like a cover-up, that's what I'm talking about. So that can't take a cover-up. So for the past, these things have been done systematically and with strictness, with strictness. The person in Ammed Baba is not just a police officer that is a police officer that is very top and... We'll come back to talking about the person of the IG but we're looking at the situation here. Back to you, Mr. Ken Robinson. Now, we already know that there are a group of people who already feel like the relationship between the police and Nigerians has been a fragile one, one that has a lot of question marks around it. And this report by the FBI has also somewhat dented that already very fragile image. How does the police even intend or where does the police begin to deal with the issue of damage control? And how can this also bring the issue of police reforms into play? Nigerian police has had a bad period. And remember the Air South protests and the panels sitting across the country. All these things have been coming out of those panels and the revelations. It's damning and it's very unfortunate that everybody thinks that we have to drive the best cars, live in the best environments. And that's the attitude by most citizens. If you're a school teacher, be a school teacher. If you're a civil servant, be a civil servant and live within the means of being a civil servant. And if you're a police officer, be content with the fact that you're a police officer and live with the salaries you're being paid. If that is not good enough for you, leave the police force. Go and look for something that will create legitimate means for you to make more money. And that's the problem we have in Nigeria. Everybody wants to be alone. Yes, go ahead. Mr. Keseke, can you please just say. So the Nigerian police force has an image problem. And this is an opportunity for them to tell the world that look not every person in the police force, not every person in the police service commission, not every Nigerian is a crook or a criminal or a thief or a cyber crime person. And so I disagree with my brother when he says the FBI has no business. There is a case going on in the U.S. and Osprey has been sinking and he has mentioned names. Those residents in the U.S. have been arrested. As I said earlier, if Abakari truly says he's innocent, he should make himself available. Go there with the best lawyers. The country can provide the lawyers for him if they love him. The police force can provide the best lawyers in the world for him. Go there and clear your name. And clear your name. And clear the image of the country. Restore the image of the Nigerian police force. It's important and we shouldn't play politics with this. Interested. Now, Hosh Papi again has a letter that he bribed Kiari to arrest one Vincent Chibuzoi, a co-fraudster, dealing with money for punishment of your enemies. I mean, a lawyer of one of the shows on Plus TV Africa said Kiari was never clean and cited a case of Evans, the kidnapper. This is more like digging up the past against him. I want to understand, does this because some of us think that Abakari is a super cop and that's what Mr. Okeje was saying. Amazing cop. And then all of a sudden, we're hearing all kinds of things as to dirty stories that are being dug up about him. So really, when we are looking, putting all of these things side by side, does it not make us largely lose more and more trust in the Nigerian police force, especially when Mr. Okeje is saying that, oh, we should allow the police to carry out its investigations. Can the police be sitting over itself in terms of... I mean, we have had cases where we've gone to the police service commission to say, check the police. In the case of NSAS, we've said, check the police in case of bribery. Check the police in the case of illegal roadblocks. We haven't really seen that yield anything feasible. So why should we trust the police to sit over this case or this investigation and not allow the FBI to take charge of that investigation? Do you want me to respond to that? Yes. I do not sincerely think that the police should undertake setting up a community to try to get the authenticity of the allegations against Abakari. This is a national... a dent on a national image. And I would have suspected, I expected rather that perhaps the Minister of Justice and Attorney General of the Federation or the Secretary of the Government of the Federation should have made a statement on this matter. And we need a committee at that level set up by the Government of Nigeria to investigate Mr. Abakari. Why do you think that the federal government seems to be very mute on this particular issue? You know how the federal government is swift to responding to issues. I mean, just last week, the US government, the US Senate put a pause on our amnesian that we were trying to buy from the US and some choppers and they cited issues of human rights abuse and immediately the federal government had put out a statement. But on this matter, this is almost day four and we're yet to hear anything from the federal government. Is it that they do not want to get involved? Yeah, we're yet to hear anything from the Minister of Information. No statement from the Minister of Information. No comment, no statement from the Attorney General of the Federation. And I'm sure everybody just tried to come to realisation that this is happening to us and that these things are there. But it's there in Nigeria and the Nigerian police force need seriously to re-evaluate, re-examine itself from top to bottom. Not just the ones in the streets and on the roads that collect money from passengers and drivers. But the Nigerian police force need a thorough overall re-evaluation and a complete overall of the police force. And the police reforms shouldn't just be very fair, they should be total. And so we expect that the second government of the Federation, we expect that the Minister of Justice will make statements and actually set up committees to see to the certain the veracity of these allegations against Abakari. Because as I said earlier, it's a dent on a national image that a police officer that had been so celebrated could be involved in something like that, alleged to be involved in this kind of a matter. And even if it's true that he was involved in this kind of a matter, then he puts the question mark on the entire police force. Including the IG of Police, who knows what are the secrets that may be behind it? There are people who seem to be saying that the government should be held responsible or accountable for this level of corruption, the fact that he was even indicted in the first place. But should we really be laying that blame at the foot of the government or should we be laying it at the foot of the Police Service Commission and the IGP, just as you said, that the IG, who knows what dirt might be dug up on him? So really, why does the blame stop right now? Because there's some bug passing right now. Is it a Nigerian problem, what we're facing right now? Should the police be looking at itself, in retrospect, to see what they can change? Or should we as Nigerians begin to re-evaluate ourselves as a country? As a country, I would say that Nigerians, we need to re-evaluate and, in fact, our value system. I made a statement earlier, I don't know what my system was on moods. But I was saying that if you are a civil servant... Oh dear, I think that we're having connection problems. ...content with the fact that you're a civil servant and leave in this and go and look for a new... Make business that will give you more money. If you're a police officer, for God's sake, be a police officer. And I say this with all sense of responsibility. We celebrate falsehood in Nigeria. And it's a general problem, not just Buhari's problem, not just the police problem, it's the Nigerian problem. Abakari comes from in place and we hear all the stories and all the things that he has been doing around where he comes from in Boronu state. And he's celebrated beyond the police. If those reports we are getting are true, how does he get the money to do those things? Nobody asked questions before now, including police force. And it's a shame. Interesting. Mr. Kezi, I'd like for you to come in here again. How do you foresee the outcome of this investigation? Because there's going to be a panel probing him. The extradition might happen, no matter how long it takes, because this is an ongoing case. But again, looking at it, the big picture in itself. Should we just be blaming a tiny bit of the problem, which is an Abakari, or should we be looking at not just paying lip service to the issue of police reforms, but of course, you know, putting some action to it, especially in terms of the welfare of these men? Yeah, just like my fellow speaker was saying, yes, there's an endemic problem in the police. Leadership comes to bear in all of this. Once you get a good leader, you find that he tries to drive the institution to where he believes that integrity and good distance will come in. So, yes, there's a lot of practices going on, but that's notwithstanding. The police has an internal mechanism whereby they weed away many of the bad officers, which unfortunately they don't come to the public to announce these things that this person has been retired, this person has been dismissed, this person has been prosecuted because of one crime or do that. These things are ongoing. There is a panel that's always going to say that they're good. Because we need to understand that people are being... Well, we know this, but these people are part of our society. It's not everything that we do that must bring to the public. It's not everything that we do that we must bring to the public. But how do we, the people, also understand that justice and fair play is at work? I'm sorry, just hold on. I'm sorry to talk over you. I'm not standing here for them. But you sound like you're speaking for them, and just hold on. I'm asking... No, not at all. It's a security institution. I know. We have to understand it. I know. But I'm asking, how do we ascertain... I'm sorry, Mr. Keizer, if you let me speak, just hold on. Let me speak. How do we ascertain that justice is being served? Especially in cases where people are being killed, people are wrongfully detained, people are shot. I mean, when we see these injustices play out in the police force that we're supposed to be looking up to, to enforce the laws of the land, if these things are done in the dark and in the quiet, how do we ensure that justice is being served? I mean, it's a bit too shady. No, it's not shady. That's why the police has some numbers that they dish out to members of the public to always call relevant authorities in the police to handle some of these cases. And those who do that, they see some of the results, and I'm sure they must have been, they can attest to some of these things. But back to the issue we're talking about, the person that was appointed to handle this, you see, I said that when I started, I said that the allegation is very heavy and that there's no way anybody can sweep it under the carpet. That I said also that arbitrary must answer to all the support from the statement he has issued. There's going to be more digging deep into some of the questions that have to be answered. So that is what that panel is going to achieve. And like I said also, that panel is some of the finest in terms of interrogation in Nigeria Police. So we should expect them, we should wait for them to come out with their report. They are not going to hide the report when the IG appointed that committee, they made it open. So it's going to be an open, I don't think they will ever hide it. And that's why I'm sure the presidency is waiting for the outcome of that. Okay, we have to go. We have to go, we're out of time, we have to go. Thank you very much. Ben Ukeje is a security analyst and a security columnist for the Sun News Piper. And of course, Mr. Ken Robinson is of Pandem. He's the National Publicity Secretary. Thank you very much gentlemen for being part of this conversation. We're looking forward to the outcome of the investigation. Well, thank you all for staying with us. We will take a short break now when we return. Southwest governors are asking for Joe political zones to have their own Supreme Court. Is it something that we can have? We'll be right back.