Police minister assures on Nigeria’s support for INTERPOL, WAPIS to end crime

The Minister of Police Affairs, Dr. Muhammad Maigari Dingyadi, has reiterated the federal government’s support of the  to INTERPOL and West African Police Information Programme (WAPIS) to end crimes in the country and sub-region.

He stated this during a courtesy visit by the INTERPOL Executive Directorate Police Services, Mr. Kavanagh Stephen, to the ministry headquarters in Abuja.

A press statemenr by the ministry’s Head, Press and Public Relations Unit, Bolaji O. Kazeem, said the minister stated that federal government has ensured that WAPIS and INTERPOL were on the ground in the country and they are willing to partner and support the effort the organizations are making to ensure that the country is crime free.

”The issue of criminality in many parts of the country is complex and varies from different locations. We need to put heads together and work as a team to ensure that we have what it takes to check criminality in the country,” Dingyadi stated.

Speaking on lack of synergy among security agencies due to the inability to share information despite huge data from different agencies, he noted that coordinating organisations like WAPIS and INTERPOL have improved cooperation among different agencies in the country.

According to him, “We are working together as a team to ensure that we fight these criminals to the end. On our part, we do whatever it takes to support you and ensure improve police service delivery in the country.

“We have a lot of criminal issues and we require cooperation and support from anywhere that will assist us to curb these criminalities.”

The spokesperson stated that,  the INTERPOL executive directorate had earlier informed the minister and security agencies of their strategic outlines mapped out to tackle adding that insecurity the idea of the WAPIS had stemmed from the Member State of the Economic Communities of West African States (ECOWAS).

He said in the new world, they looked out and saw how people projected their arms, and moved money, drugs, child abuse, scamming of others, terrorist finance, and their cells across the borders with impunity and the need to stop and disrupt their activities by sharing information.

“We can use all information from the security, border and intelligence agencies can bring together to share more data effectively across the world. We are not here to have a nice time; we are here to make sure we understand how WAPIS can support West Africa to share data that exist among the security agencies effectively,” he stated.