Police cadet dies in academy, colleagues allege starvation

An 100-level course 9 police cadet, A.S. Jika, dropped dead at the Nigeria Police Academy, Wudil, Kano State, on Saturday, after being continuously starved and malnourished for over two weeks. Some of the cadets accused the Commandant, Assistant Inspector-General, Sadiq Abubakar, of high-handedness and financial mismanagement of feeding allowance meant for the students.

Jika, who hailed from Adamawa State, and was in the Department of Computer Science, collapsed inside the toilet in the early hours of Saturday.

A cadet, who spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid being victimized, said the victim was rushed to the academy’s clinic.

“He was left untreated because there are no drugs and no medical officer to attend to him in the unconducive environment, before he gave up and died,” the source added.

A cadet, who also asked not to be identified, said there was usually high traffic of sickly cadets at the unequipped clinic on a daily basis.

He said, “Since the new commandant assumed office, they’ve been providing very bad and inadequate food for us. The boy that died was not up to 20 years old. The boy wouldn’t have died if they’d attended to him. The commandant also ordered the closure of the market and laundry and approved undeserved training exercises during lecture hours.

“Cadets collapse daily here during training due to fatigue, because it’s either they’re starved, malnourished, or both. We’re usually threatened by the commandant and forced to engage in unwarranted training exercises. Also, many cadets have been dismissed on the basis that they fell sick; that’s why many are trying to manage themselves to avoid expulsion from the academy.”

Meanwhile, staff members, who spoke to our correspondent, complained about the monthly feeding allowance of the academy.

A source privy to the running of the academy revealed that part of the money was usually diverted into private pockets by some top officials.

When contacted on Saturday, the Commandant, AIG Abubakar, didn’t respond to phone calls and text messages from our correspondent.