The House of Representative on Tuesday rejected a bill requesting it to order the Acting Inspector General of Police to reverse his order on the dismantling of checkpoints across the country.
Friday Itulah (PDP Edo State) who sponsored the bill argued that the IG’s action had led to increased armed robberies on the highways.
He said armed robbers had taken advantage of the situation and were more daring than before on the highways.
Mr Itula called for an interactive session between the House Committee on Police Affairs and the police to discuss the matter.
Some other lawmakers spoke in favour of the bill to return police checkpoints to the roads while others spoke against it.
The speaker of the House, Aminu Tambuwal threw the motion up for vote and the voted against it.
Kicking against the motion, Ayo Omidiran and Udoh Ibeji recalled that armed robbers always unleashed terror on commuters when the checkpoints were in place, while the police could not respond appropriately.
Mrs Omidrian asked those clamouring for a return of the checkpoint to provide a statistics of how “many armed robbers and terrorists were the police operatives able to arrest at the various checkpoints across the country when roadblocks were in place?”
She received a thunderous “none” and commendation in response to the question.
They advised the IG to continue with his security plans, but urged him to quickly replace the checkpoints with regular patrols on the highways.
