The presidential candidate of the Nigeria Democratic Congress, NDC, Peter Obi, has called for the implementation of state police in the country to be postponed until after the 2027 general elections. While stopping short of opposing the idea itself, he warned that the proposed security structure could be vulnerable to political manipulation if it is introduced without adequate safeguards in place.
His intervention comes as the plan advances through the National Assembly. The Senate has passed a constitutional amendment bill seeking to establish state police across the country, a step toward allowing sub-national governments to run their own forces rather than relying solely on the centrally controlled Nigeria Police. The proposal has long been floated as a response to the persistent insecurity affecting many parts of the country.
In his statement, Obi was careful not to dismiss the reform outright. He described the passage of the bill by the National Assembly as a significant milestone in Nigeria's search for solutions to insecurity, noting that many Nigerians had long advocated for the decentralization of policing. By framing it as a milestone, he placed himself among those who accept that the current arrangement has reached its limits.
He went on to argue that the scale of the country itself strengthens the case for change. Nigeria's size, diversity and security realities, he said, make a highly centralized policing system increasingly difficult to sustain. In that reading, the debate is less about whether policing should be reformed and more about how and when such a far-reaching change should be put into effect.
It is on the question of timing that Obi sounded his strongest note of caution. He pointed to the suspicion that a state-controlled police force could be weaponized to suppress political rivals, disrupt opposition rallies and manipulate elections. Placing such forces in the hands of governors on the eve of a national vote, in his view, risks turning a security reform into an instrument of partisan advantage.
Part of what informs his concern is personal. Obi indicated that there are plans to stop him from contesting the 2027 election, linking the issue to a legal threat directed at the platform on which he intends to run. That platform is the NDC, the party he has adopted as the vehicle for his presidential ambitions, and any move against it would carry direct consequences for his candidacy.
Taken together, his remarks position him at the intersection of security reform and electoral politics. He is not asking lawmakers to abandon state police, but to hold back its rollout until the charged period around the 2027 vote has passed, so that a measure meant to confront insecurity is not deployed in ways that could shape the contest it is supposed to stand apart from. The constitutional amendment process, meanwhile, still has further stages to clear before the structure can take effect.