A counter-terrorism surveillance programme meant to assist the police in their counter-terror campaign has died following non-release of funds by the Ministry of Police Affairs, which proposed the idea.
The programme, designed to recruit informants and spies that could penetrate the Boko Haram Islamic sect and other militant organisations in the country, failed to leave the drawing board as its proponents denied it of funds, it was learnt.
Saturday PUNCH investigations indicate that the programme entails the recruitment of ordinary people like commercial motorcyclists, bus drivers, artisans, kiosk owners, petty businessmen and women, students and other members of the society, who could pass useful information and security tips that could be processed into hard intelligence for use by counter-terror personnel and intelligence officers.
To implement the programme, the sum of N345.3m was budgeted by the ministry in its 2012 budget, but the money was not released and it could not be immediately ascertained what it was eventually used for by ministry officials.
A senior police officer stated that no money was released to the programme coordinator, adding that there had been no recruitment of spies by the anti-terror surveillance unit.
He explained that 10 officers were sent abroad for counter-terror training in 2010, and were expected to train other police officers.
“But since they came back, nothing has been done; personnel from the force were drawn to form the unit, but money was not released to keep the unit functional and the Force has not recruited even a single spy for the past years; the issue has been no money and the ministry has not released anything,” the source stated.
The idea for the surveillance programme was said to have been borrowed from a United States security programme, the Terrorism Information and Prevention System, a domestic intelligence-gathering program proposed by former President George Bush.
When contacted, the Deputy Force Public Relations Officer, Frank Mba, claimed ignorance of the surveillance programme. “I don’t know anything about the programme,” he said curtly.
The Deputy Director, Press, Ministry of Police Affairs, James Odaudu, could not be reached for comment. Calls to his phone and an SMS failed to reach him.
