The Inspector General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, has said that the force needs about N245 billion to address the shortage of patrol vehicles in the country.
IGP Egbetokun noted that each of the 1,537 divisional police headquarters across the country need at least four patrol vehicles.
The IGP identified poor funding and inadequate manpower as some of the challenges facing the Nigeria Police Force.
“The police also find themselves operating in a very difficult environment. The manpower in the police today is grossly inadequate,” he said.
“Even the criminals know that. The United Nations ratio of 1 to 400 is not attainable in Nigeria as of today. Because the ratio in Nigeria is one to 1,000, which suggests that we have to double the manpower.
“We have 1,537 police divisional headquarters across 774 local government areas. But getting operational vehicles for the divisions is difficult. Each of these divisions requires at least four functional patrol vehicles. But we have divisions which don’t have any patrol vehicles as of today.”
“For each of the 1,537 police divisional headquarters to get four patrol vehicles, it means the police would need to acquire about 6,148 vehicles,” he added.
