IGP Stresses The Importance Of Active Citizens’ Engagement In The Fight Against Crime And Criminality

The Inspector-General of Police, IGP Usman Alkali Baba, , has stressed the importance of active citizens’ engagement through the provision of actionable criminal information to security agencies to help curb crimes and criminalities.

At a three-day Security and Peace Summit themed Mitigating Contemporary Security Challenges for Sustainable Development in Gombe State on Tuesday, the IGP stated that deepening the engagement of the concept of community partnership, technology-driven policing, and intelligence-based model in mitigating the current internal security challenges in the country is crucial.

“This policing strategy seeks to address security challenges through an active citizens engagement in the identification, analysis, and mitigation of threats, and to actualise it, the communities and strategic stakeholders have critical roles to play.

“The Nigeria Police Force, under my leadership, considers it imperative that community leaders, community-based associations, local community groups, and all citizens are actively engaged towards feeling their pulse, evolving a common synergy, and presenting a common front to contain security challenges that are threatening our communal peace, safety, and security,” he noted.

According to the IGP, crime is dynamic and addressing it on a sustainable basis requires innovative approaches and the buy-in of all components of society.

He asserted that Gombe State is one of the States in the Federation with the least incidences of violent crimes but the dynamic nature of crimes makes it imperative that strategies are evolved to have an upper hand in the State’s security.

Meanwhile, IGP Baba expressed gratitude to the State Governor for continuously supporting the Nigeria Police Force and other security agencies.