Officer commanding police department with ward in the West (8)
I believe the answer is:
occident
'west' is the definition.
(synonyms)
'officer commanding police department with ward in the' is the wordplay.
I cannot really see how this works, but
'officer' could be 'oc' (I've seen this in other clues) and 'oc' is located in the answer.
'police' could be 'cid' (abbreviation for Criminal Investigation Department) and 'cid' is found in the answer.
'the' could be 't' (the is pronounced as a 't' sound in some dialects) and 't' is found within the answer.
The remaining letters 'en' is a valid word which might be clued in a way I don't see.
This may be the basis of clue (or it may be nonsense).
Can you help me to learn more?
(Other definitions for occident that I've seen before include "West End?" , "The West as opposed to Orient" , "Europe and America" .)