Rivers Police Commissioner Stays In Hotel For 6 Months Because Mbu Refused To Vacate Accomodation

The Commissioner of Police, Rivers State Police command, Tunde Ogunsakin, has been lodging in a hotel in Port Harcourt since his resumption in that state as the Police boss some five months ago.Ogunsakin’s predecessor and controversial Commissioner of Police, Mbu Joseph Mbu, has refused to vacate the CP’s official residence located in new GRA, Port Harcourt.Sources at the Rivers State Police command said Mbu rather deployed over 15 Policemen from the FCT command to Rivers State to provide security at the empty house.
Sources told our Correspondent that Ogunsakin had made several efforts to move to the official residence but all to no avail, as Mbu, now the Commissioner of Police, Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Abuja, refused to vacate the place.Consequently, Ogunsakin is spending whopping sums of money as hotel bills. “The Force has no facility in the area of accommodation for Policemen on transfers above one month. This is because arrangement about your accommodation would have been made by the Force management through the state government in the case of senior Police officers.
“Oga’s hotel bill is accumulating and it’s getting huge and huge every day. Though there have been offers by people to assist, he is saying no for obvious reasons. Even, he has rejected the state government offer to pick his bills. I think I support him, why should he take such offer when there is official house meant for the State Commissioner of Police in the State,” a senior Police officer told our Correspondent in a telephone interview.Mbu was transferred from Oyo State Police Command to Rivers in the wake of the political crisis in that state.It was gathered that just like he could not calm frayed nerves in Oyo State, he could not also manage the Rivers State political upheaval.
This is even as the Network on Police Reform in Nigeria, known by the acronym NOPRIN, has called on the Police Service Commission (PSC) to exercise its statutory oversight, and invoke its disciplinary powers against Mr. Mbu.
He is the Commissioner for Police for the FCT, caught in a controversial move, his critics say, for subverting Nigeria’s constitution, and infringing on the fundamental rights of Nigerians to freedom of expression.
A statement issued to the media by NOPRIN, and obtained by our Correspondent, says, “It is shocking that this self-same Mbu, who perpetrated several acts of illegality, as Commissioner of Police in Rivers State, has been retained in the NPF and only redeployed as CP of the FCT where he has continued with his reckless and unprofessional acts which run contrary to all norms of democratic policing.”
The NOPRIN statement also calls on the PSC to, for once, “demonstrate some semblance of responsibility by dismissing Mbu for his numerous acts of misconduct, illegality and subversion” of the norms and practices of democratic policing.
The statement was written and signed by Okechukwu Nwanguma, NOPRIN’s National Coordinator.
When contacted for reaction, the Rivers State Police spokesperson, Ahmad Muhammad, said efforts were being made to secure the official apartment for the incumbent state Police boss.
He said, “This is an internal matter. I don’t think the press should be involved here. We are making efforts to get the apartment free for the new CP please.”
Similarly, Mr. Mbu did not pick several calls , neither did he respond to a text message earlier sent to him