By Daily Review Online
The House of Representatives on Thursday passed the State Police Bill, paving the way for the decentralisation of Nigeria’s policing system amid growing concerns over insecurity across the country.
The bill secured overwhelming support during plenary, with 289 lawmakers voting in favour and only one member voting against the proposal. Speaker Tajudeen Abbas, who presided over the session, did not participate in the vote.
The House had dedicated Thursday’s sitting to deliberations and voting on the controversial legislation in response to the recent surge in killings, kidnappings and bandit attacks nationwide.
Proceedings, however, witnessed a brief disruption when a member representing Kaduna State, Bashir Zubairu of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), raised a point of order. He complained that the report on the proposed state police, prepared by the House Committee on Constitution Review, was made available to lawmakers only shortly before the session.
According to Zubairu, members had not been given sufficient time to study the document before voting on such a critical constitutional matter.
“Mr Speaker, this document was only made available to lawmakers in the chambers, and we are yet to go through it. We cannot do justice to it because we have not gone through it,” he argued.
The Speaker, however, ruled him out of order, allowing deliberations to continue.
As Abbas proceeded to take lawmakers through the various clauses of the bill, several members could be heard calling for points of order, but the presiding officer declined to entertain them.
Before voting commenced, Abbas informed the House that the electronic voting system was not functioning and announced that the exercise would instead be conducted based on members present in the chamber.
Out of the 290 lawmakers recorded in attendance, 289 voted in support of the bill, while one member opposed it.
The passage of the bill marks a significant milestone in ongoing efforts to reform Nigeria’s security architecture and address persistent calls for state-controlled policing as a strategy to tackle rising insecurity across the federation.
The bill will now proceed to the next stage of the constitutional amendment process