African Law Foundation(AFRILAW), a Non- Governmental Organization, has engaged Civil Society Organizations(CSOs) and the media in an effort to reform operations of private security outfits in Nigeria to meet with international best practices.
The Chief Executive Officer of AFRILAW, Mr. Okereke Chinwike,. made this known at a two day capacity building workshop for CSOs and media on Tuesday in Abuja.
Speaking on the theme of the workshop, “Private Security Governance Challenges and the Relevance of International Norms and Best Practices”, Chinwike noted that it was important to reorganize private security outfits in the country to ensure professionalism.
“The workshop is organized to build the capacity of CSOs and media practitioners a document we will be launching tomorrow on private security in Nigeria.
“Today’s workshop is to train CSOs and media practitioners on how to use the document as a tool of engagement, ”he said.
According to him, the role of private security operatives, particularly in the face of current insecurity in the country cannot be undermined.
He stressed that while the number of private security operatives in the country were many, there was no effective regulation of their activities, leading to a number of misconducts and lack of synergy with government owned security agencies.
Chinwike disclosed that an executive bill was underway to give legal backing to the activities of private security outfits as well as regulate their activities to check excesses.
He said that while there were few laws regulating their operations, they were obsolete and required review to capture emerging security challenges.
He expressed optimism that at the end of the programme, the role of civil society organizations and the media in ensuring good governance of private security in Nigeria would be enhanced.
The News Agency of Nigeria(NAN) reports that the workshop has different sessions on various thematic areas like monitoring and reporting of private security companies’ human rights abuse.
Other areas of focus are strengthening the role of the CSOs and the media, gender and private security companies among others.(NAN).
