We’ve stopped our personnel from entering vehicles of offenders, says FRSC

Dauda Biu, the corps marshal of the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), says personnel have been mandated to stop entering the vehicles of offenders during seizure.

Bisi Kazeem, FRSC spokesperson, in a statement on Thursday, said Biu made the clarification while dismissing a “wrongly couched” memo currently making the rounds.

Kazeem said the memo in question relates to a directive issued to commanding officers, which called for an end to the practice of placing patrol operatives in the vehicles of offenders during impoundment.

The spokesperson said the original directive was issued in a memo dated September 12 2023, with reference FRSC/HQ/OPS/94/VOLXVI/094.

He added that the memo was titled: ‘Immediate ban on the placing of staff in offenders vehicles to escort for Impoundment’.

“This was however, interpreted as a complete ban on the impoundment of vehicles by the corps,” NAN quoted Kazeem as saying.

“For the avoidance of doubt, the corps marshal’s directive was a correction of an earlier one saying impoundment of vehicles have been banned, captured under paragraph III of the aforementioned memo.

“However, the corps marshal only banned placing of staff in offenders vehicles to escort for impoundment by patrol teams under any guise of traffic infraction committed with immediate effect.

“The corps regrets any confusion caused by the earlier memo, and would like to inform the public that the current position of the corps was as outlined in the corrected directive.”