Revista Internacional de Economia e Ciências de Gestão

An Appraisal of the Causes of Delayed Response to Crime Incidents in “Area B” Police Command of Metropolitan Lagos, Nigeria

Abstract

Nwoye Casmier Friday

Crime incidents in Lagos State, particularly in Metropolitan areas, have become worrisome and have resulted in severe loss of lives and property over the years. Unfortunately the Nigerian Police, which is the major constituted security agency, has not lived up to expectations in terms of responding promptly to crime incidents when they occur in the area. This situation calls for urgent attention, especially now that Lagos State is at an inception stage of being one of the Mega Cities in Africa and in the Globe. Thus, this study aimed at exploring the causes of delayed response to crime in Area B Police Command of Lagos Metropolis. Its focus was to analyze the physical and human variables responsible for delayed responses of the men of Nigerian Police. Physical factors such as accessibility and spatial distribution of Police Divisions within the study area were examined. Human induced factors, as they bolder on attitude and motivations of the respondents were also analyzed. The Methodology involved a combination of quantitative, qualitative and location analysis. Primary spatial and non-spatial data were collected on the field by direct readings as well as field observation, interviews and questionnaire administration to both residents and the police. All these were analysed using GIS and Statistical Packages for Social Sciences (SPSS). The findings revealed that delayed response to crime incidences in the study area resulted from both human and infrastructural factors. Only three of the Police stations were highly accessible while most others were averagely accessible. However, there was a police division with little or no accessibility. This perhaps accounts for the delayed responses to crime incidents occurring in this division. Analysis of questionnaire revealed that most of the residents did not promptly report crime incidences and when they did, the responses was not speedily conveyed because they had reported the incidence through rather slow means. On the part of the police, inadequate welfare and infrastructural facilities accounted for low motivation which invariably fuels delayed response.