The Nigeria Police Force (NPF) has been ranked as the worst police force in the world, according to World Internal Security and Police Index International (WISPI).
The 2016 report rates the Nigeria Police Force the “worst” globally in terms of its ability to handle internal security challenges.
The report was released by the International Police Science Association (IPSA) and the Institute for Economics and Peace, a nonprofit organisation that brings together experts, researchers and scholars concerned with security work from all over the world.
The indices used in accessing 127 countries from four key areas, namely, capacity, process, legitimacy and outcomes, aim to measure the ability of the security apparatus within a country to respond to internal security challenges, both now and in future.
Nigeria police performed worst on the index on all the four domains, with a score of 0.255 ranked 127 below Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya, Uganda and Pakistan.
The report noted that countries with protracted civil conflicts were not eligible for the index.
“There are 219 police officers for every 100,000 Nigerians, well below both the Index median of 300, and the sub-Saharan Africa region average of 268,” the report reads.
“This limits the capacity of the force to measure up to its law and order mandate.
“In terms of process, legitimacy and outcomes, the story is not different which makes the force fall short of the required standard.”
According to the report, the top 10 performing African countries are Botswana which ranked highest at 47, followed by Rwanda which took the 50 position.
Others are Algeria, Senegal, Tunisia, Egypt, Burkina Faso, Ghana, South Africa and Mali, in that order.
The 10 least performing African countries are Madagascar 111th, Zambia 112th, Ethiopia 115th, Sierra Leone 117th, Cameroon 120th, Mozambique 122nd, Uganda 124th, Kenya 125th and Democratic Republic of Congo 126th.
The report showed that Singapore performed best on the index, followed by Finland, and then Denmark.
There were only four non-European countries in the top 20. The United Arab Emirates was the highest ranked country from the Middle East and North African, MENA, region as it ranked 29th overall.
