Anyone driving round the roundabout outside Lagos PSP last week will have noticed a gaggle of policemen, head down, inside the bonnet of a patrol car. What was not so clear was that this was a sign that “vehicle-fitness” at the station is down to rock bottom.
“One of the patrol cars smokes, and has done for some time and the men refuse to drive in it,” a police source at the station is quoted as telling Correio da Manhã.
“Another has no indicator lights and a third has a problem with the driver’s window.”
Running the story with the opening paragraph: “The patrol cars of Lagos PSP are almost all out of order, a situation that is compromising the efficient patrolling of the town,” the article goes on however to say the police are still “able to circulate”.
Guaranteeing that everything was being sorted “as quickly as possible”, the PSP District Command told the newspaper that the station had since taken delivery of “a substitute provisionary vehicle” to make up for the one belching out smoke.
Meantime, the government has agreed to “around €14 million” being spent on new vehicles for PSP and GNR forces, said the newspaper.
