The Lagos State Government says it will be championing a cause to improve citizen-police relationship in the state.
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Lagos State Governor, Mr Babajide Sanwo-Olu said this on Tuesday when he received the Inspector General of Police (IGP), Muhammed Adamu, at the State House in Marina, on a commiseration visit.
Sanwo-Olu said that improving citizen-police relationship would prevent recurrence of the issues that led to the #EndSARS protest.
Six police officers were reported slain in Lagos, 36 critically injured, while 46 police stations were torched in the #EndSARS protest mayhem.
The governor commiserated with the IGP over the mob attacks on police personnel and torching of their stations.
He commended the officers in the State Police Command for exercising restraint in the face of the attacks by hoodlums who hijacked the #EndSARS protest.
Sanwo-Olu intimated the IGP on the move by the state government to rebuild the razed police stations and offer scholarship awards to the children of the officers killed in the violence.
He assured Adamu that all the requests sent to the state government by the police would be fulfilled.
Briefing newsmen on his mission, the IGP said he was in the state to commiserate with the governor and residents, and to assess the police assets vandalised.
“Lagos was the epicentre where the EndSARS protest took place and the destruction in the subsequent violence was more in Lagos than any other part.
” I came to commiserate with the governor and people of the state. The destruction they suffered was uncalled for.
“The second leg of my visit is to see the police stations destroyed and boost the morale of our men in Lagos.
“We don’t want them to be demoralised by the event in which they suffered personal attacks.
“Policemen are trained to take such pain. Now that the event has happened, it shouldn’t discourage us from performing our constitutional duties,´´ Adamu said.
The police boss said that the morale of some officers had dampened in the light of the violence, but his visit would encourage them to give their all in protecting the lives and properties of the citizens.
Adamu said the scale of the destruction witnessed in Lagos and around the country threw up the need by Nigerians to adopt standard protocols for public protests whenever they wanted to express their grievances against the system.
“It is very important to set up protocols that will prevent hoodlums from hijacking peaceful protest organised with good intentions.
“The moment the protest organisers don’t have leadership, the purpose and intent of the effort would be defeated.
“As we have seen in the case of EndSARS protest, no economy will be able to bear the loss that we have seen in Lagos,´´ he said.