The Nigeria Police Force has dismissed recent reports alleging that 3,907 firearms are missing from its armouries, stating that the claims are misleading and do not reflect the reality of the situation.
In a statement issued on Thursday, the Force Public Relations Officer, Olumuyiwa Adejobi, emphasised that the allegations stemmed from a 2019 audit report by the Office of the Auditor-General of the Federation and do not indicate an actual disappearance of arms.
Adejobi maintained that such figures do not reflect the current status of their armouries, noting that weapons assigned to officers for operations may not always be present during audits.
This clarification follows a February 11 report, which detailed how the Senate Public Accounts Committee grilled the Inspector-General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun, over discrepancies in police armoury records, which during the hearing,
The committee expressed concern that 178,459 firearms, including 88,078 AK-47 rifles, were allegedly missing from police formations across the country, citing findings from the Auditor-General’s 2019 audit report.
