The new Commissioner of Police, Edo State, Johnson Kokumo, yesterday said community policing and intelligence gathering were sure ways of checking crimes in the state. He stated this at a press briefing where he revealed that five additional suspects have been arrested over the killing of a professor at the University of Benin (UNIBEN), Prof. Paul Otasowie, besides the two suspects earlier arrested.
He also disclosed that the Edo State Police Command has recovered the mobile phone of Otasowie, who was killed by yet to be identified gunmen.
The late Otasowie of the Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering in UNIBEN was killed on October 4 at his residence at Ekenwan Road.
Kokumo said the phone was recovered from a suspect, adding that a family member of the late Otasowie has identified the phone as being the one taken from the professor
“I want to say in clear terms that we are going to partner with communities and our partnership with communities will be in phases; we are going to partner with traditional rulers, we are going to partner with religious leaders, we are going to partner with market women, we will partner with professional bodies and several stakeholders and civil society groups. We will do all these because one information is more important than many AK 47 rifles.”
He paraded 53 suspects where he sought the support of relevant government agencies and the judiciary in the fight against crime and delivery of criminal justice administration.
Earlier in the government house where he was received by Governor Godwin Obaseki, he said he is currently doing criminal profiling in the state and in a matter of days would come out with a strategy aimed at fighting crimes. He advised criminals to relocate from Edo as it would no longer be a haven for their activities.
Obaseki pledged his administration’s support for the new police commissioner to enable him succeed in his new assignment. The governor urged the new police boss to urgently change the security plan he inherited to curb crimes in the state.
“We need to change the entire security architecture in the state and together we will work to implement it and address all the security challenges in the next one week,” he said.
