Public perspectives of interventions aimed at building confidence in the Nigerian police: a systematic review

ABSTRACT

Police-public relations in Nigeria has been marred by issues of distrust, torture and violence. This study adopts a systematic review to fill a gap on the interventions relied on to improve public trust for the police in Nigeria and public perspectives of these interventions. 11 studies met the inclusion criteria. Informed by the principles of thematic analysis, it was found that there were scepticism, lack of trust, and perceived ineffectiveness of community policing interventions. The review recommends community-informed randomised controlled trial interventions in tandem with the police in order to foster public trust and legitimacy for the police.

KEYWORDS:

• Crime
• intervention
• Nigeria
• police
• public
• trust

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).