Photo credit: Sun Newspaper –
ABUJA – The Presidency has commenced the final legislative push for state police with a seven-week work plan that will see an Executive Bill ready for President Bola Tinubu by September 3, 2026.
The proposed National Policing Bill is expected to lay the legal and operational foundation for Nigeria’s transition from a single federal police system to a dual federal-state policing model.
Chairman of the Presidential Working Group on the National Policing Bill and Chief of Staff to the President, Femi Gbajabiamila, disclosed this on Monday after the committee’s inaugural meeting at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
Gbajabiamila described the exercise as one of the administration’s most far-reaching institutional reforms.
According to him, the approved work programme will run from July 27 to September 14, with the Executive Bill package scheduled for presentation to the President on September 3. The draft will then go through nationwide public consultations before transmission to the National Assembly.
“The timetable is demanding, but it is not a shortcut. Legal drafting, policy research, data analysis and implementation modelling will proceed simultaneously with rigorous review mechanisms,” Gbajabiamila said.
He explained that the final package will go beyond the Bill itself to include implementation guidelines, fiscal projections, legal audits, state readiness assessments, risk analysis and work plans to ensure effective execution.
Public Participation Opened
To broaden citizen input, Gbajabiamila said Nigerians have been invited to submit memoranda within the next 10 days via nationalpolicingbill.com, where progress on the reform can also be tracked.
“The whole idea behind state policing is for every Nigerian to take ownership of the process,” he said.
Checks Against Abuse
Attorney-General of the Federation, Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, assured that the Bill will embed minimum national standards to ensure professionalism and prevent state police from being used as a tool for political persecution.
Funding For States
On concerns that some states cannot fund state police, Gbajabiamila said the Nigeria Police Force will continue to provide coverage in states not yet ready, pending empirical state-by-state financial assessments.
Ogun State Governor, Dapo Abiodun, who is also a member of the Working Group, added that the committee is considering federal grants to help less financially buoyant states establish their own police services.
Gbajabiamila insisted decentralised policing is long overdue, noting that no federal system in the world operates a unitary police structure.
SOURCE: The Sun Nigeria –