Disbandment of Anti-Daba: Why I disagree with Hon. Sha’aban Ibrahim Sharada-Alhassan Haruna Dambatta

First, I must commend the Commissioner of Police, CP HABU A. Sani psc Kalamu-Waheed for his discreet strategy in keeping Kano safe, he earned our respect because his tenure has its own challenges especially during the COVID-19 lockdown but this man of humility never failed to discharge the difficult task of keeping the ancient, commercial city of Kano safe like never before.

As a listening natural leader, CP Habu A. Sani psc has never failed to listen to the people complaints, never slacked in addressing issues of security and most importantly, he is the first Commissioner of police that we know who engaged the community directly in keeping the peace.

Can you imagine that the PPRO Kano command DSP Abdullahi Haruna Kiyawa has a media group in which people of various community interacts and promote peaceful coexistence as well, this is unprecedented, unmatched yet by any sister state close by, we appreciate this effort and for sure it demands from us the reward of diamond and gold.

We must equally appreciate the many sacrifices by senior and junior officers of Kano command for their selfless and dedicated service to the people of the state, many amongst them have served and are still serving under difficult conditions without proper care and poor remuneration.

Though, with all the obstacles on their path, they have never failed in responding to distress signals sent by the people, only that they lacked the manpower to keep Kano safe in total.

These among many other reasons was the onus on why the police have to engage constabulary as casual police officers, all to the direction of reducing the burden on the permanent officers to attend to other more important engagement in keeping peace and maintaining order.

Of course mistakes and miscalculation always try to devour all concepts, the reason why contingency plans are developed to take care of the unseen situation.

Daba was a criminal concept promoted by miscreants and criminals who sees no good reason in allowing peace to prevail, so, they formed themselves into criminal clans, maintaining a criminal identity, names and territory and are easily provoked even by their own people of the community. They can attack at any moment and their brothers and sisters are not an exception to their merciless attack that are on many occasions done with well sharpen knives, swords, jackknives and barber’s knife.

Inside the city, the ‘Yan-Daba concept has become hereditary from which enormity of generations are kept alive, neighbours killing neighbours and friends attacking friends.

Before the police Anti-Daba team was formed, the atrocities of the ‘Yan-Daba was beyond perception, is just that we are a people of short memory, killings were recorded on daily basis in those days, and the people called for an immediate response from the police and the police responded with the establishment of special Anti-Daba team.

The team then was mounted by dedicated permanent and pensionable officers who shouldered the responsibility of getting rid of the ‘Yan-Daba who tormented, killed many of our brothers, friends and citizens.

The new formation was soon applauded for their gallantry and in no time the ‘Yan-Daba situation were reduced, some of them got killed, others were jailed and some fled whilst many of them were reformed.

The Anti-Daba team at the beginning were merciless in their mode of arrest, of course they have to be because they were dealing with thieves, armed robbers and serial killers, hence, they have to protect themselves during raids because those they are to arrest are most of the time well-armed and in possession of assorted well sharpen swords and knives.

The modality of their operation I believe affected their psychology and sense of reasoning, hence, they see everyone as an enemy especially when they meet somebody at a black spot and this was caused due to the mixing of the formally approved police operational guidelines, ethics, rules and regulations with the reasoning of those who are specially trained to work as the Anti-Daba team on a jamboree of arrest.

Almost every Anti-Daba team on the routine operation is saturated with many team members that are neither police nor constabulary. They are members of jobless Youths in the community who were engaged to assist the police in the promotion of peace and security.

Those engaged are neither properly trained nor educated on the concept of policing, most of them are illiterates who knows nothing of Mercy, publicity and damage control. So, they act with impunity and they regard killing as a form of their gallantry in contributing to operational successes. Many amongst them are repentant criminals, Ex-convicts and rehabilitated drug users, so they know every nooks and crannies where criminals of their kinds converge for their nefarious activities. As leads and informants, they point and locate these hideout and help the police in effecting arrest, the only mistake made was that they were allowed to partake in actual Operations which was caused by lack and shortage of dedicated personnel.

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Things did fall apart, because whilst the various incidence of the Anti-Daba brutality were recorded in the past, the recent happening are beyond imagination and it points to the need to Reform the Anti-Daba concept by first weeding out all these contracted jaguars who have killed more of our people than the police itself. Some of these recorded incidences include;

 

1. In October of this year, one Saifullahi of Kofar Mata was attacked and killed by Anti-Daba unit at Kofar Mata quarters of Kano municipal from which youths of the area see reasons to burned tyres and protested against this nefarious crime of killings of innocent defenceless citizens in Kano state.

 

2. On the 1st of November 2020, it was alleged that some trigger happy member of the Anti-Daba unit of the Nigeria police named Baffa killer went with his team to Sani Mainagge quarters around 11:30 pm and killed one youth named Auwalu Musa of 26years of age and a resident of Sani Mainagge.

It happened when the victim Auwalu musa came back from Mauludi, this group of Anti-Daba personnel laid ambush and Baffa killer (name of the accused) who was believed by the community to be on a mission of settling scores with his former foes in the community, many in the community even believed that he purposely joined the Anti-Daba team to deal with some of his perceived enemies. He attacked and killed this young boy in cold blood. The issue was only reported by Radio France Hausa on the 18th of this month, eighteen days after the murderous killing was carried out the mother was still pleading for justice, though, the issue has already been brought to the attention of the Commissioner of police by the Kungiyar Matasan Kano Advocacy organisation Gwale local government chapter and the people believe that the authorities will take immediate action.

3. Yet again, another incident was recorded on the 14th of November 2020 where a team of the same Anti-Daba unit of the Nigeria police Kano went to Sharada quarters of Kano municipal local government of Kano state and brutally killed two of our youths, Abubakar Isah and Ibrahim Suleiman. They were brutally murdered by one Ado and his colleagues of the Anti-Daba unit for no just cause, the case has already been reported to the Inspector General of Police IGP Mohammed Adamu.

There are several other instances of acts of brutality by the anti daba unit, hence the need to sort for a solution to this menace, what is more, required now is a collective responsibility to deal with the situation, this is why in my opinion vary with that of Hon. Sha’aban Ibrahim Sharada, Lawmaker representing Kano Municipal, at the House of Representatives, who called for total disbandment as a lasting solution.

Experience they say is not what happened to a man but what he does with what happened to him, hence the need for us to look at all directions of the recent past where miscreants used long old acrimony to settle scores by employing violence as a means to an end.

We in Kano, on the other hand, have now found protest and riots as old fashion in sending messages but see Advocacy as the new way of getting our leaders to do the right thing.

This is why Kungiyar Matasan Kano Advocacy will sponsor a private bill for “A Bill for the Reform of Anti-Daba unit of the police” from which those rouges and criminals will find no place to partake in dedicated operations that will require the service of trained personnel.

Both Kano municipal chapter of Kungiyar Matasan Kano and that of Gwale local government have written to both their Reps in the house of assembly to sponsor the bill as mentioned above. The Advocacy will equally call the attention of the speaker of Kano state House of Assembly, Right Hon. Garba Gafasa to wade in and support the passage of the bill in that respect.

We wish to advise the Commissioner of police of Kano command to on the short term medium introduce some drastic measures to curtail and nip in the bud this news of unnecessary killings of innocent citizens not by the police but by some miscreants engaged to help in policing the community who turned out to be habitual criminals that will never cease from the act of criminality.

We share the pain with the police being left in inhabitable houses, bad remuneration and inadequate personnel and worst of it is the lack of modern weaponry and training — an avenue in which dedicated officers are empowered with the knowledge of modern policing. We shall in the future act in such direction but for now, we should reform the Anti-Daba unit not disband it.

Comrade Alhassan Haruna Dambatta Chairman Kungiyar Matasan Kano Advocacy organisation.matasankanoofficial@gmail.com