The Senate has expressed dissatisfaction with the Nigeria Police Force’s explanation regarding 3,907 assault rifles and pistols allegedly missing from its armoury as of January 2020.
According to the representative of the Auditor General for the Federation (AuGF), Olu Godwin, the audit report for 2019 raised concerns about the loss of firearms. The review of the arms movement register, monthly returns of arms and ammunition, and the ammunition register at the police armory section revealed that as of December 2018, a total of 178,459 firearms were missing including 88, 078 AK-47 rifles.
The upper chamber insisted that the police must provide a detailed account of the missing arms and ammunition.
Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Kayode Egbetokun faced intense scrutiny from the Senate Public Accounts Committee (SPAC) on Tuesday over the audit report, which exposed the alarming loss of firearms across police formations. The committee expressed concern that such a high number of missing weapons posed a serious security risk to the country.
The report also noted inconsistencies in police records. For instance, documents from the Force Armament at the Force Headquarters showed that the 21 Police Mobile Force Squadron in Abuja did not report any missing firearms. However, a separate schedule obtained from the same department indicated that 46 firearms had gone missing between 2000 and 2019.
In response, the police attempted to account for missing rifles dating as far back as 1998 but could only provide explanations for 15 out of the 3,907 missing firearms listed in the Auditor General’s report. This lack of concrete answers frustrated the Senate committee, which rejected the police’s request for a closed-door session to discuss the matter privately.
The committee insisted that the police must take full responsibility and provide a thorough breakdown of the missing firearms. Despite failing to give a satisfactory response, the police pleaded for more time to conduct a detailed investigation and submit comprehensive findings.