The Senate has been urged by Inspector-General of Police (IGP) Kayode Egbetokun to look into the purported disappearance of 3,907 assault rifles for security-related reasons behind closed doors.
Egbetokun stated in a letter sent to the Senate that the 2019 Auditor-General for the Federation’s report, which asserted that thousands of rifles were missing or unaccounted for in the police arsenal as of January 2020, was false.
The letter, which Senate President Godswill Akpabio read following the passage of the 2025 budget, was sent 48 hours after the Senate Committee on Accounts held a rigorous investigative hearing in which senior police officers, including the IGP, appeared and found it difficult to respond to the Auditor-General’s report on missing firearms.
We commend the Senate committee’s investigation into the purportedly missing firearms, and we implore it to hold future hearings on delicate security matters behind closed doors to avoid giving the wrong impression to Nigerians and the world community,” the letter said.
In addition to preventing misinformation and safeguarding national security interests, holding hearings on these delicate security matters behind closed doors will promote more open communication and fact-finding.
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In order to conduct internal investigations into the incident, the IGP also asked the MPs to provide them further time.
In Abuja, Olumuyiwa Adejobi, the force’s spokesperson, responded to the audit report yesterday by telling reporters that every attempt had been made to account for the weapons that were removed, but that many of them had been returned to the force’s current arms holdings.
