CCTV: No more hiding place for
criminals in Lagos....Governor Babatunde Fashola of Lagos State, top
members of his executive counciland some senior
journalists, penultimate witnessed  a public
demonstration of the use of  1,200 security cameras
CCTVs already deployed in Lagos State by the
Federal Government. The security demonstration was carried out with the
aid of 27-screen video wall monitors At the event, the recorded scene of an armed robbery
incident at the Murtala Muhhammed International
Airport, MMIA, last year was relayed on the video
wall. The gang of dare-devil armed robbers attacked a
Bureau de Change, carting away huge sums of
 money in both local and foreign currencies. The
spell-bound audience  watched the video clips at the
Command and Control Centre, Alausa. Unknown to the armed robbers, security cameras
otherwise called CCTV cameras installed at strategic
places to monitor activities, clearly captured the
robbery operation. With this, the Police were able to close up on the
criminals who were apprehended after some months
of painstaking manhunt. The arrested criminals were
later paraded before the public and newsmen. The arrest of these daredevil robbers attest to the
relevance of security cameras in monitoring, fighting
and tracking down criminal activities in the society,
especially in Lagos which is undoubtedly, the most
populous state in Nigeria. In 2009 the State government launched a pilot phase
of the CCTV initiative. The solar powered CCTVs
were introduced in three locations in the state –
Falomo Bridge, Third Mainland Bridge and Eko
Bridge. The project, which was aimed at checking the
effectiveness of the concept, was adjudged successful. Thedemonstration of the screen-video monitors was
carried out by the Permanent Secretary, Ministry of
Science and Technology, Mrs Nike Animashaun,
using the Lagos airport scene as a case study. Ongoing activities at the airport, Agege Motor Road
and Oshodi can be monitored through the security
cameras. The screen could zoom in on individuals,
number plates  and indeed anything. The Director, Computer Services in the Ministry of
Science and Technology, Mr Debola Omoboya, in his
presentation took the audience through the
emergency telephony demo and how the state had
been able to leverage on the emergency telephony
infrastructure. He demonstrated four key services namely, the
emergency telephony system, the video surveillance
system, the video conferencing system and the e-
police system which is based on the call centre
located in the Command Centre. Lagos State Commissioner for Science and
Technology, Adebiyi Mabadeje, at the event, said the
State Government had concluded arrangements to
add another 1,000 security cameras to the existing
1,200. According to him, security equipments already
deployed to the state include 1,000 plus surveillance
cameras, 66 base-stations on CDMA technology,
microwave links, normal telephony capacity network
with 3G data capabilities. He added that the
government had concluded plans to purchase 10, 000 additional handsets for use by the police, RRS, Lagos
State Traffic Management Authority, LASTMA,
Ambulance and Fire Service, among others. Already, the cameras have been deployed in critical
locations, such as Ikorodu Road, Oshodi, Agege
Motor Road and Festac.  He further disclosed that
2,000 handsets had been given to members of the
police and Rapid Response Squad, RRS. A visibly elated Fashola said that his government was
planning to expand existing camera and telephony
infrastructure to support deployment of the additional
cameras to effectively cover the entire state in a bid
to make it safe and secure. The Governor was
optimistic that with all these security equipments being put in place, there would be no hiding place for
criminals in the state any more. He explained that the demonstration was a follow up
to what was started in 2008 when a pilot scheme was
located in Lekki in with one camera. The
demonstration, he said, was meant to show how far
his administration had gone in spite of the many
criticisms and doubts cast on the project. “Now we have moved from a zero camera State to
about 1,200 Camera State. How significant that is,
some numbers would show us. We are now in a
position where we are now on one camera to about 10
sq kilometers, so we are far behind other cities like
New York and London, where they range between 200 and 450 cameras per Sq km, but we have moved
from zero over 4000 Sq. kilometers and we have
reduced that distance significantly. How did we do it,
we have merged our cameras with the ones that the
Federal Government installed, so we have taken all
the feeds in here. We have moved from one small screen that you saw in Lekki to 27 screens that are
collapsible in all forms either to one big wall, three
screens and so on,” he explained. “We followed that with house numbering, all of which
are still work- in-progress and we realise that now that
we could get police to move, but how do we call
them? We moved from an 11 digit number to three
digit number, 767 or 112 because we did not think
people in trauma will remember an 11 digit number easily and how quickly you can contact the police or
ambulance is the difference between what
practitioners of disaster management call the golden
hour,” he said. Residents react Reacting to the initiative, Akinloye Badmus, a civil
engineer, lauded the governments for making efforts
to secure lives and properties of Lagosians. He
however called for regular maintenance of the
facilities. “What about the maintenance of those CCTV
Cameras, who are those committed to operate and
manage the system and the base of the circuit, are
they real professionals with tested integrity? he
asked. A  civil servant who identified himself as Abiola
Akeem simply retorted: “Nice one. Let’s hope that the
National Biometric Database is finally implemented
the way it ought to be! Without that, all the CCTV
cameras in the world would be an exercise in futility.” “But, sincerely, I wish the government a successful
implementation because we shall be beneficiaries at
the end of the day. Mrs. Ngozi John, a trader, said she is not
knowledgeable about the usefulness of CCTV
cameras but said from her little understanding, the
initiative could only work if there could be rapid
response to crime scenes.