Gender discrimination in police
The bill which seeks to amend the Nigeria Police Force Act to expunge all forms of discrimination against female police officers has passed second reading in the Senate. The bill’s sponsor Ezenwa Francis Onyewuchi said some provisions of the Act discriminated against female police officers in terms of restriction of duties to telephones, clerical and office functions. It also compels single female officers who intend to marry to seek approval of the Inspector General of Police who is at liberty to inquire the occupation, residence and character of the suitor. An unmarried female officer who gets pregnant could also be sanctioned by the IGP.
A look at the regulations of the Police Act which were first enacted in 1968, especially as regards rules for enlistment into the police, indicates where the offending articles are. Regulation 122 of the conditions of service for female police officers provides that ‘’Women police officers recruited to the General Duties Branch of the Force may, in order to relieve male officers from these duties, be employed in any of the following duties namely: Clerical duties, Telephone duties and office orderly duties.
Regulation 127 provides that an unmarried police officer who becomes pregnant shall be discharged from the Force. the most worrisome provision is regulation 124 which stipulates that, ‘’A woman police officer who is desirous of marrying must first apply in writing to the Commissioner of Police for the State Police Command in which she is serving requesting permission to marry. Permission will be granted for the marriage if the intended husband is of good character and the woman officer had served the Force for a period of not less than three years’’.
These provisions are anachronistic and they probably violate Section 42 of the 1999 constitution as well as Article 2 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights and the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). Nigeria is a signatory to both.
These Police Force regulations were enacted fifty one years ago when there were very few women in official working places. All the professions and working places were dominated by the menfolk, who wrote the rules to their fancy. Since then women have made giant strides in all areas, in some cases surpassing the men in numbers. Nigerian women have over the years excelled in the police, with several rising to the position of Deputy Inspector General, DIG. in the Police Force today, many women have attained exalted ranks by dint of hard and meritorious work.
The continued retention of patently discriminatory regulations in the Police Force Act, aside from possibly violating the constitution, are demoralising to women serving in the Police Force. The provisions place women police officers at a disadvantage over their male colleagues in that they will have to do more to earn their positions. the morale of women police officers is dampened, knowing that they are just there to make up the numbers and are restricted to some duties. It denies them the satisfaction of knowing that they can both serve their fatherland as law enforcement officers and fulfil their natural obligations to be dutiful wives and mothers.
That women police officers have made remarkable progress all these years despite the existence of such discouraging regulations is a testimony to their determination to overcome the odds placed before them in the force. Having come this far, it is now time for these regulations to be removed from the Police Act.
We urge the Senate to move expeditiously in this direction. We note that in many parts of the world, strictures on women police officers have since been removed allowing for equal opportunities for both male and female officers in law enforcement duties. Although the provisions of the constitution vest the final determinant of how this law will be amended on the President, it is however a needful action which has been long overdue.