Police refuses to set up post at the University of Maiduguri despite Boko Haram attacks

The Police Command in Borno on Thursday ruled out the possibility of setting up police post at University of Maiduguri, UNIMAID, following increased suicide bombings by suspected Boko Haram terrorists.

There have been at least eight suicide attacks on the university in the past five months.

The Commissioner of Police in the state, Damian Chukwu, stated the stance of the police in

an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria in Maiduguri.
you will have set up a difficult precedence.
security arrangements in the university.

Mr. Chukwu was reacting to calls for the police to move and checkmate the activities of the bombers at the institution.

He explained that setting up police posts in the institution would create difficult precedence for other universities to follow.

He added that “let me say here that once you establish a police post in UNIMAID,

“This is because every other university would want the police to set up posts in their campuses too.

“It is not the universities; even other tertiary institutions would want such posts established in their campuses.”He, however, said the police had been collaborating with the university outfit to ensure security at the campus.

He explained that “originally, the university security outfit had been in charge of

“But since January when we started having suicide bomb attacks, we injected some security agents, including policemen and the military into the system.”

The police boss said that the action initially paid off as it led to reduction of suicide bomb attacks in the university.

He, however, added that with the renewed attacks, the police and other security agencies had worked out plans to put an end to the bombings.

He said that “very soon these incidences of suicide bombings would be a thing of the past, I can assure you.

“The arrangement we are making now is such that it will be difficult for any miscreant or bomber to gain access into the university,” Mr. Chukwu said.

Becky Edubi, a female staff of the university was killed after multi suicide bomb attacks last Sunday.

Two other staff were injured during the attack.

An earlier attack led to the death of a professor of veterinary medicine in the university.

The university staff and students on Wednesday accused the federal government of not doing enough to prevent Boko Haram attacks in the institution.The staff and students’ unions gave various reasons for their stance including the non-approval by the federal government of N2.8 billion requested by the university authority to procure modern security equipment to stop Boko Haram from executing “greater attacks” on the campus.