BY STEPHEN
DIJO PHILEMON
Dr. Ubong King is a seasoned security practitioner who
seats atop a giant security outfit: Protection Plus Security Services Group of
Company as a Group Managing Director, Expert in Maritime Security and Peace
Ambassador.
A man who traverses all segments of
private security practices, in this no-hold-bar interview with Stephen Dijo
Philemon examines the synergy between private security practice and public
security agencies in Nigeria.
Inadequacies in taming organized crime
like; armed robbery, kidnapping across the land as well as insurgency in the northern fringe of Nigeria and
the way out of the logjam. It is educating, informing and an eye opening. Read
on:
Can we meet you?
KING: My name is Ubong King. I am from Akwa Ibom State, South
South Nigeria. I am the Managing Director of Protection Plus Security Services
Limited which has a subsidiary which includes Heritage Treasure Group. It is a
brand and image of the company. We have the Heritage Guards which is also an adversory
security company. We are also into Maritme Security, Oil
and Gas. So, I seat as a Group Managing Director of the group of the companies.
I am a graduate of University of
Calabar, Cross River State South South Nigeria. I am an alumnus of the Lagos Business
School. I am the President Senior Management Class 27 Programme of Lagos Business
School. I am a member governing council Lagos Business School. I am a board
member Nigeria Trinidad Chambers of Commerce. I am chairman America Society of
Industrial Security (ASIS) International Chapter 202, Lagos Nigeria. I am
married with children.
How is it managing a gigantic security
outfit like yours?
KING: Being gigantic is relative because what you call
gigantic to one person may actually be a small thing to another. It depends on
one’s mental capacity. For me, I did not enter private security practice
because I wanted to provide marguarding services; I entered because I perceived
a system failure in the society. And if you look at the global competitive
report, you will see why security is a challenge. That report tells us that in Nigeria,
our situation have not been upright, because of that, we have a policy that is
not protective to our people or help the country to determine how strong we
are.
For instance, you have somebody who
wants to sing, he goes to studio to record the song. A day before the launching
of his album, he goes to the road and sees six thousand pirated copies of his
song yet to be launched. There is nothing that looks like protecting him and
his intellectual property. There is an index global report that portrays
Nigeria in bad light. I give you a classic example.
A Chinese came to this
country, he sees that we don’t have power- electricity. Everybody lives on
generators or he knows that there is poverty in the land. He reads a report
that out of 150million people in the country, a sizeable numbers of them are
poor and the few that are employed, their take home is N60,000 monthly. So,
what he does, he goes back to his country, makes a report and makes a
rechargeable lamp with a poor quality that will last only one month so that
they can buy another one later, having known they have poor purchasing power.
If our standard control system; the
Standard Organization of Nigeria (SON) is effective, such equipment should not
come into this country. That is why people say the qualities of products
shipped to Nigeria are adulterated because low quality products come to Africa.
You can see we have a big challenge and we must tackle it headlong with a
gigantic strength. You can see now that the gigantic you are ascribing to me is relative. And for me, I develop myself to
meet up with that challenge.
How will you rate the synergy between
private security system and public security agency as a solution to national
security problem?
KING: Currently in Nigeria, it is very poor. If we are able
to integrate the two, we will be strong and responsive country to security
challenges like in advanced country. I give you an example; sometimes in 2012,
a riot broke out in London when Olympic was to start in September, just a month
to the event. Some young boys went on rampage, looting shops, breaking into
shops, maiming, wounding, robbing and disposes people of their belongings. CNN
captured it as it was going on. Just a few months after, CNN also reported that
they have arrested the people, because the kinds of CCTV or cameras they use
have an identification system which is run on a special card. All they need is
just a part of your face showing on the database.
It will indicate your
address, where you have been in the last few days, where you will be in the
next few days. If you are the type that goes to school every Monday, the Police
will wait for you at the school and as soon as they spot you, they arrest you. But
we don’t have that in Nigeria. Now we have Boko Haram. Though, we seem to be
winning the war, why is it difficult to apprehend and fish them out amidst the populace,
after all their not spirit, they are human being living among us. They transact
business in banks and other segments of the society.
They wouldn’t have been evading
arrest if our system work well. It is because we don’t have adequate technology
to fight crime, crime fighting has gone beyond shooting gun, detection and
prevention is the antidote in crime prevention all over the world nowadays. If
there were CCTV camera or other detective device, it will capture the footage of
their operation on a data system. It will show facial card or biometric. Once
that happens, any one of them that uses ATM, it will show the address and the
security agents will pick him up
But as we don’t have those thing
integrated into our security system, we are just exposing our military men, the
Police and other security agents to guerrilla warfare. If we improve our
technology to meet our challenge, we will be able to solve our problems. This
is because, security technology or system comes from private sector, then the
public sector benefits. All the equipments the foreign public security agencies
are using in the advanced country are all made by private sector.
All the
technology advancement have gone private and public sector use it or give
contract to the private sector to produce it. The research and development of
this technology are on the platform of the private sector. Though, the public
sector don’t possess it, but they can advise the private sector, this is what
we need to combat crime, go and produce it. But when we don’t do that, we
expose our security agents to mayhem and death.
I am aware that you, along with Chief
Patrick Keku, Chairman Pahek Security Services and others have tried to put the
synergy to the nation’s front banner when you went to the National Assembly,
the Senate in particular in those days to push for a bill on National Security
Commission, what becomes of the move?
KING: One of the things I remember is that, the project was
hijacked and it was to be taken over by public parastatal because the concern
then was that, the project was not meant for private sector, that it was public
sector initiative.
But those of you in the private sector
initiated the idea in the first instance.
KING: Yes, but it did not work that way because even if you
look at our public policy in this country, one of the challenges is that those
in charge, the leadership are not exposed, they are not knowledgeable to face
the challenges on ground. When a man is not knowledgeable about the situation
of things, how can he give direction? So, when you elect a leadership who does
not know how to identify a problem, you have an issue. They have created more
problems because there is no smoke without fire. So if you want to off the
smoke, quench the fire. You trace the source of the fire before you deal with
it. If you can not find the source of the fire, you are wasting your time
trying to put off the fire.
As the chairman of ASIS, how has it
being?
KING: It is a very interesting and dynamic because in ASIS, I
have the collage of both private and public sector practitioners at a senior
level and everybody that is there must know how a company must operate, how it
must work. But as leadership, the value of ASIS is one, education, and two,
experience. If you have education without experience, it will not work and if
you have experience without education, it will not work.
But when you have the two together, you
benefit from the two and you apply them on the job. Now, we have five hundred
and fifty members as security directors. Of course, they think like
professionals and business men or women. You give directive strategy on what
people will like to see functioning and one of these things we have done is to
have a digital unit right now. Everything about ASIS Lagos is online. Your
appearance and attendance at the meeting is only physical thing we need.
The minutes of the meetings and other
documentation, transaction are online so that you are able to see things first
hand. We have a Google group of about 300members in there. So any intelligent
information that somebody shares, 300 people get it and they can build on or
add to it.
So any information anybody gets anywhere and as leadership, anything
you post on Google that is not factual, you will be excommunicated straight
away. So people are very careful, I don’t want to hear anybody saying news
reaching me now says something is happening in Ajah, No. what you will tell me
is, now at Ajah, this particular incident is happening. You must be specific.
You must be sure of your fact. Then I know you are presenting fact, and not stories.
How will you assess ASIS impact on
private security in Nigeria?
KING: First of all, as I have said, education is a key to
development. For example, during 2015 elections period, you will remember that
as ASIS, we postulated what is going to happen. We represent security
companies.
We paint a scenario, did analysis of what is going to happen, that
there will be crisis in some states. What shall we do as security managers? That
helped us to do a risk assessment and evaluation plan, advisory and short term
plan on disaster management, so those that are not sharp in these studies, when
they come to ASIS meeting, they became sharp and they go back, apply it and
their value is better appreciated in the business. That is why when you come to
ASIS meeting, we have one of the largest attendance every month because
everybody adds value. So when you improve yourself every month, you see you are
always better than what you were before.
It appears not every private security
practitioner wants to be associated with ASIS. Is it an inferiority complex?
KING: No. I will not say it is an inferiority complex. I will
say it is a personal value. There is nobody who should not grow in knowledge
and at a level of security management. What matters is your intelligent
network. If you are wise, grow your intelligent and your network. You will be a
better person for it. First of all, a lot of people don’t know about ASIS and
they don’t want to know. Another thing is that they limit themselves.
When you know and you don’t want to join
ASIS because of some petit things, you have problem not me. But if you know and
you join, you will find out that there is local and international value because
you become Certified Protection Practitioners (CPP) and you will be rated among
the best in the world or Professional Certified Investigator (PCI) and you will
possess all other relevant professional credentials that place you on
appropriate pedestal in security worldwide.
You can go any where as your certification
allows you to be recognized all over the world, but if you limit yourself to a myopic
mindset, you will be limited only to your guard. What is more, we have best
speakers both local and foreign. So people have a lot to gain in being members
of ASIS.
May be some people see ASIS as a foreign
thing.
KING: No. That should not be, because we have local leaders
occupying big positions in the system. How is it a foreign thing? We have
security managers that are mainly local. In fact, we have Africans who are
foreigners alike who come to join ASIS because they have seen the value. Yes,
and they are enjoying it because they have seen the value and you don’t need to
convince somebody to benefit what is valuable to him. They say it is in the
eating of the porrage that you know the sweetness. So you can see, it is not
just a white man affair. It is not a racial thing, it is about security and
security transcends colour.
How will you evaluate the private
security practitioners in Nigeria vis-à-vis the New Association; Association of
Licensed Private Security Practitioners of Nigeria (ALPSN) that have just been
formed as an umbrella body for the practitioners. Have they met the expectation
of Nigerians?
KING: I will say so far, we are operating maximum at
20percent. Why I say this is because marguarding is not only aspect of
security. There are different areas but majority of the practitioners are only
on private guards. There is no even licensed for private investigation. It has
become the sole prerogative of State Security Services. We don’t even have a
private body that can formulate strategy against crime in this country.
You
remember there was a young man that did auto bug. If you enter a car it will
show. In different countries, it is not that people don’t jump into a car
through window. What they did is that, having known that they cannot stop
people from breaking into the cars, they device a technology to detect and arrest
the culprits
The world has gone technological,
Nigeria should not be an exception. Government should create and enabling
environment. There is no doubting the fact that, Nigerians are genius. This is
evident in that, Nigerians are making waves in Europe and America and other
parts of the world. So if we are not performing such feat in our own country,
definitely something is wrong with us. It is a systemic failure.
No comments:
Post a Comment