Police Defy Court Order To Unseal Peace Corps Building
The Nigeria Police have said they will not obey the court order charging them to reopen the Gwarimpa, Abuja, headquarters of the Peace Corps of Nigeria.
The police authorities said for the “interest of national security and public safety,” they will continue to keep the Peace Corps building under lock and key.
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The Force PRO, Jimoh Moshood, said in a statement in Abuja: “The attention of the Nigeria Police Force (NPF) has been drawn to innuendos and misinformation in some media reports on the closure of the Peace Corps of Nigeria office in Jabi, Abuja.
“The Force wishes to inform the general public that the order proscribing the existence and operations of Peace Corps of Nigeria is still in force in the country.
“It is incumbent on the NPF to inform the public that on February 28, 2017, the NPF officers in a joint operation military and the Department of State Service (DSS) personnel embarked on an operation to halt and rid the country of illegal security outfits constituting national security threats.
“However, it has been observed that some of the prescribed illegal security outfits and the Peace Corps are still operating outside the mandates and purposes for which they were registered by the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC),” it stated.
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Efforts made by the Corps since the early 2000s to be converted into a paramilitary outfit have suffered resistance by the Police and other security agencies.
The Federal Government had in 2009 ordered the ban on all activities of the Corps, describing its doings as being similar to that of the dreaded Boko Haram group.
The police had also in 2013 said that the Peace Corps of Nigeria, Nigerian Maritime Security Agency (NMSA), Nigerian Merchant Navy Corps (NMNC) and the Nigerian Merchant Navy Petroleum Security and Safety (NMNPSS) were prescribed in a Federal Republic of Nigeria official gazette.
Meanwhile, a bill for the establishment of the Corps as an agency of the government was recently passed by National Assembly and has been sent to President Muhammadu Buhari for signing into law.
