The Rivers State Police Command has set up a panel to investigate a Divisional Police Officer (DPO) who is alleged to own an illegal refinery in the state.
The Acting State Police Public Relations Officer, DSP Grace Iringe-Koko, who disclosed this in a statement released on Sunday, January 16, said the unnamed DPO has been “immediately redeployed and a panel headed by an assistant commissioner of police inaugurated to investigate the matter”
According to the statement, the outcome of the investigation shall be made public and the officer will be punished appropriately if the allegations are confirmed.
WITHIN NIGERIA recalls that Governor Nyesom Wike had raised the alarm this week and demanded that the DPO, who was in charge of a division in a community called Rumuji in the Emohua Local Government Area, be redeployed for allegedly operating one of the illegal oil wells.
The governor, who is concerned about the soot pollution in the state named the DPO in Emohua Local Government Area as one of the operators of illegal refineries in the area.
“It’s unfortunate for this country how security people will be involved in illegal bunkering. I can’t believe it. Mr. CP, I thank you for transferring the DPO in Rumuji, who owns a refinery. But the man must leave here, not transferred. He must leave this state.
“I can’t be governor here and security man owns an illegal refinery. No, it is not possible, the man has to go. Take him to wherever they allow bunkering,” he said.