Police Recruitment: Ex-IG Smith Quits As PSC’s Chairman

• President Buhari okays resignation

BY EDMOND ODOK – Amid swirling controversy surrounding the recruitment process into the Nigeria Police Force, the Chairman of the Police Service Commission (PSC), Muslim Smith, has resigned from the post.

Coming on the heels of disputation over the recruitment process into the Nigeria Police Force (NPF), insiders hinted that Alhaji Smith only heeded the counsel of the PSC’s board to throw in the towel for reasons not quite clear.

The IGP’s office has been at loggerheads with the PSC in a bitter supremacy battle over the right to conduct recruitment of constables into the Force with the Police hierarchy distancing itself from a recent advert placed by the Commission in some national dailies on the recruitment of personnel.

However, reports indicated that Smith, a former Inspector-General of Police from 1999 to 2002, took the decision to resign from office based on health grounds and his letter of resignation was forwarded to President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday, September 6, 2022.

It was further gathered that the President formally acknowledged and approved Smith’s resignation on Monday, September 12, 2022.

With the recent development, it was gathered that retired Justice Clara Ogunbiyi may now step in temporarily to oversee the affairs of the PSC.

Confirming the development to journalists on Wednesday, September 14, the spokesperson of  PSC, Ikechukwu Ani, dismissed reports that the former IGP was forced to resign by the President over the Commission’s intractable disagreement with the NPF leadership.

Appointed IGP in May 1999, the 76-year-old Lagos State indigene retired from service in March 2002 following a partial nationwide police strike and was replaced by Mustafa Adebayo Balogun, popularly called Tafa Balogun.

The chairman of Skye Bank Board of Directors in 2006, Musiliu Smith was appointed by Lagos State Governor Babatunde Fashola in 2007 to head the Lagos State Security Council (LSSC), a body charged with taking a holistic look at the anatomy of crime in the state.