…Adigwu: The incoming policy would be the industry game changer
By Dele Ogbodo
For a more effective national security template, the Federal Government through the Ministry of Interior on Tuesday, commenced deliberation on the implementation of a sweeping reform through setting of new licensing standards and categorization framework of Nigeria’s private security guard industry with the aim of ensuring efficient service delivery for Nigerians.
The Minister of Interior, Dr. Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, while declaring open a stakeholders meeting in Abuja, acknowledged that globally, private security guards play critical role in economic development, national security architecture and of course very critical factor in enhancing the overall national development of our country.
He said: “The administration of President Bola Tinubu and of course the vision and mission of the Ministry, think realistically that Nigeria cannot be an exception to the evolving global trend of private guard dynamics and operation.
While underscoring, the overarching import of holistic reform in the sector, Tunji-Ojo, added that there is urgent needfor new standardization and categorization in the industry, he said: “We want to standardize the whole process, end to end. We will need your cooperation and we need to work together.
“I can assure you that the ultimate beneficiaries will be you and Nigerians because when people trust you more they will patronize you.
“The problem today is that people are scared. People are worried of handling critical responsibility to private guards, people are skeptical of the quality of your service.
“We have 200 million people to police and to secure. The market is there. This is the biggest market in Africa.
“The country needs you in a professional manner to deliver efficient service. The country does not need your quantity, the country needs your quality.”
While expressing the urgency for the new categorization that will emerge after the brainstorming session, he added, after this meeting it will all be about implementation, adding, we will have categories A, B and C. That is what the Ministry has decided.
To address the defective mechanism, he stressed that the Ministry is coming up with new biometric features that would be domiciled in government data bank for every guard officers that customers can feel safe and free to patronize the industry.
On competency and skills acquisition, he said: “And at any time when you progress we will know and when you get to certain level of management because there are certain courses that we expect you to take to be able to move further.
The Minister said: “There are some that will be nationwide license, there are some that will be regional licence and if you don’t have the capacity to open offices all over you should be able to operate your business in one region or the other just like we have in the banks, and some that want to start can start from state and you must start from somewhere.”
Looking at the industry landscape, Tunji-Ojo, also acknowledged that the potentials are largely under tapped, and noting that the effect of the industry over our national security architecture over the years has been attenuated due to lack of standardization.
He asked: “Should I say that in terms of policy formulation and at best in terms of global practices and what we are going to do today and that why we are working with the stakeholders as you can see the NSCDC CG, the Permanent Secretary is here the President of the Association of Licenced Security Agencies is here and all the stakeholders that are needed within the private security sector and they are actually here.
“We want to put our heads together to see how we can categories operators, standardize operations and enhance efficiency and productivity and of course how to also allow Nigerians to be able to take charge in terms of tapping the resources available within the private security guards.
We believe that this will bring about more paying jobs to Nigerians and of course better security for Nigerians and better productivity and then a more efficient system and then we will be able to add and contribute more to the GDP in terms of what the private security companies can do.
On minimum standards, he said, government is government up through NSCDC to ramping up skills acquisition, training and capacity development to bring about global benchmark, adding: “For instance the skills that you need to secure a bank is not the same skill that you need to secure a home school, they are 2 different things.
“The skill that you need to be able to handle an oil and gas company might not necessarily be the same when you are securing a school.
“There has to be categorization and it has to be on capacity, competency and of course based on needs of the customers and above all apart from categorization and review of licensing provision we must also look at the guard management system that was approved by FEC in December 2023 which aims to give the power of verification and authentication back to the people and it is the key responsibility of government to secure and to protect lives and properties.”
“We have seen in recent cases that it is becoming difficult for people to leave their children with a guard because they could have history of paedophiles or leave their wives with guards that may be a rapist.
“So background check is very important and we want to be able to see that process, make our guards people of integrity and of course ensure that once somebody comes as a guard we have his biometrics his data in case if there is any issue we can track you and we make sure that justice catches up with you and so this will confidence to Nigerians known fully well that they are not just bringing strangers to their homes in the name of guards.
“Every guard will be well known to Nigerians because there will be a room to do a background check and of course there will also be a room to able to recommend or comment in terms of the platform that is coming and so if somebody misbehaves and leaves and of course just like the UBER that you can do rating and of course that must identify the person and sincerely that guard must have a unique number enabled in terms of their ID card.
Also speaking at the sideline of the meeting, the National President of the Association of Licensed Private Security Practitioners of Nigeria (ALPSPN), Dr. Chris Adigwu, said what the association needs is standardization and professionalism.
He stressed: “In every sector of our national life, there is always best practices and I believe that what we are activating today is a game changer for us and as an industry probably we cannot keep doing the same and expecting different result.
“So this is an opportunity for us to engage our regulator in as much as this policies are coming we need so that the manner and processes of implementation will also be something that we can easily run with.”
While commending the Minister for the bold move, he said: “But in short they are all commendable we would want to compete with our counterparts globally and this is the right step moving forward
“We have issues with the training our guards we have issues with verifiable and credible data base of our operatives who are working with us and a lot of more and with this it is step forward and I believe that we will keep on improving it is a process and I believe that that process has started already and
“For our industry we are going to have a buy in also it is good that the Ministry has created this platform because we are going to have a one-on-one as we leave this place and we will all agree on the best way forward.”
The idea of new policy, he added is welcome, but the modalities and procedures are what we need to engage with one another and make sure that there is only one winner in this equation which is that the internal security management of Nigerians must be strengthened.
He said however, “We are a critical mass and we have our spread across virtually every nook and cranny of Nigeria and an industry that employs over 5 million Nigerians in both formal and informal sector and if our services are optimized, standardized, I believe that it will greatly help in reducing the burden on the state actors.”
