The Senate Committee on Public Accounts witnessed a dramatic interrogation of Assistant Inspector General of Police AIG Suleiman Abdul on Tuesday regarding 3,907 missing assault rifles, majority of which were AK-47s.
The representative of the Federation’s Auditor General read the 2019 Audit Query, which revealed that “as at January 2020, a total of 3,907 assault rifles were either missing or could not be accounted for by the Police.” The AIG, speaking on behalf of the Inspector General of Police, listened with rapt attention.
This comes after Kayode Egbetokun, the Inspector-General of Police, apologized to the Senate Committee on Public Accounts for not accepting earlier invitations.
After apologizing to the Committee and taking an oath, Egbetokun designated AIG Suleiman Abdul, the Assistant Inspector General of Police in Charge of Public Accounts and Budget, to respond to the eight questions the office of the Auditor-General had posed to the Police.
Question one, which borders on the alleged non-execution of a N1.136 billion contract, was vacated by the Committee, which was chaired by Senator Peter Nwaebonyi, representing Ebonyi North. However, it upheld Question 3, which borders on the alleged missing 3,907 Assault Riffles, many of which were Ak 47.
In his opinion, “the total number of lost firearms as at December 2018 stood at 178,459 out of which 88,078 are AK-47 Riffles.
“However as at January, 2020 based on thorough Auditing carrried out, 3, 907 assault rifles and Pistols across different Police formations could not be accounted for.”
He identified the lost firearms as follows: 1, 721 from Police Mobile Force (PMF) 1 to 68, 42 from 23 police formations, 1,514 from 37 police commands, 29 from Zones 1 to 12, and 601 from 15 training institutions.
The Committee members were incensed by the report and questioned the police team about why they hadn’t received a response since it was released.
Neither AIG Suleiman Abdul nor any of his lieutenants were able to provide the committee with compelling explanations for the 3,907 assault rifles that went missing in their answers.
AIG Abdul, apparently overwhelmed by the flurry of questions directed at him, requested a closed-door meeting, but the majority of the Committee members—including Senators Joel Onawakpo-Thomas and Adams Oshiomhole, the Deputy Chairman who chaired the meeting—rejected his request.
Senator Nwaebonyi specifically stated that no closed-door sessions would be permitted under him when he denied AIG Abdul’s request.
“This is a public accounts committee that has no room for closed door session. In united states of America, proceeedings of Public Accounts Committee are televised live.
“So whatever response the AIG wants to make on the missing assault rifles, should be done in the full glare of all, particularly the journalists”, he said.
Also rejecting the AIG request for a closed door session, Senator Oshiomhole in his remarks said: “The Police is known for arresting and parading thieves of rats and rabbits which is expected of them on the missing assault rifles.
“The AIG should let Nigerians know steps that had been taken by the Police on the missing assault rifles over the years, who and who were involved and level of recovery made”.
Members of the committee were further enraged by the AIG’s weak response, which only accounted for 15 of the 3,907 missing assault rifles, 14 of which he said were lost due to servicemen died in active duty and one in 1998.
Since the question will never be ignored, the committee later decided that the AIG and his staff should go and clean up their response in order to facilitate a gentle landing.
As a result, it deferred consideration of the final five questions and instructed them to come before it by 12 p.m. on Monday of the following week.
