The House Committees on Interior and Police Affairs will be interfacing with the Nigeria Police Force and the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corp in view of approving a standard uniform for private security companies in Nigeria that can be distinguished from those of government agencies.

Presenting the motion on the floor of the House, Hon. Jimoh Abdulraheem Olajide (APC: Lagos) stated that private security guard companies compliment efforts of the Nigeria Police Force and other security operatives by securing lives, property and the maintenance of law and order. He mentioned that in some western countries, private security guards played a huge part in providing employment for citizens with some countries having private guards that outnumbered police officers and other government run security agencies.

Speaking on the motion, Hon Olajide highlighted however that it was currently difficult to distinguish between Federal Government security operatives from private security outfits, and legally registered private security companies from the unregistered ones due to the similarity in their uniforms. He added that Section 16 (1) and (2) of the Private Guard Companies Act that empowered the Minister of Interior to approve uniforms for Private Security Companies stated that the uniform must be clearly distinguished from that of Government security operatives.

Hon Olajide citing Ghana as an example of a country with similar regulations noted that the Inspector-General of Police of Ghana, David Asante-Apeatu, had launched three (3) approved uniforms for the private Security companies operating in Ghana to distinguish them from those of government security agencies in a bid to address any inadvertent security threat that private guards uniforms could pose to the country. Finally, he underscored the importance of limiting the number of uniforms used by the Private Security Companies in Nigeria to address the security threats posed by fake security officers using different types of uniform.