Lucky Obukohwo, Reporting
The Edo State Commissioner of Police, Betty Enekpen Otimenyin, called for community policing to help arrest crime and criminality in the state.
She made the emphasis during her courtesy visit on members of the Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Edo State Council.
CP Otimenyin said crime prevention is better and cheaper than detection, saying that, when citizens volunteer information to the police, it will help them to do their jobs better and save the people from harms.
Otimenyin added that, her mission is to make the state safe for everyone and businesses to thrive.
The CP urged everyone to join hands with the police to police the State to build a safer environment.
“Our essence of our coming to Edo State is to ensure that we make the state a safe environment. We want to ensure that everyone of us who come from Edo state or are visitors in the state when they come in, they will be happy
“We want to build environment that will be friendly, an environment where businesses can thrive, where people can live, where tourism that the state is known for can thrive, where your businesses can work, where those in the diaspora can come home and be sure that they can invest.
“We want to build an environment that where everybody will be safe. That is why we say ‘wherever you are, if you see something, you say something’. That means, you give us information, because, with information, we will be able to work,” she said.
The Police Commissioner also emphasized on the need for everyone to know his or her neighbors, to help check criminal activities like armed robbery and cultism.
“We also want you to know that you should know your neighbors, it is very important. Now that we have a law on kidnapping and cultism that has been domesticated, is simply shows that if you give your house to such people, your house will be brought down.
“So, know who you are putting around you, know who is your friend, know who you relate with, know your neighbors, know everything around you, be your brothers keeper, those around you.
“Tell us something and we will do something, when you see anything, we want to do a collective work, policing is about everybody it’s you and me, get involved in it, this is another phase of policing where we are all partners. We are all together, we have things at stake.
“What you sow is what you will reap, if you watch a criminal operate and you didn’t talk about it, how are you sure you will not be the next victim? That is why we are saying, when you see something, say something”, Otimenyin said
Responding, the Chairman of Nigeria Union of Journalists (NUJ), Comrade Festus Alenkhe, assured the CP of mutual working relationship with the State Police Command.