Okota Police Lagos: A Tale of Harassment, Intimidation, Terror, Disservice...

Inspector-General of Police

 

When the inspector general of police gave an order that outlawed checkpoints the Nigerian public applauded. A relief that would see an end to the extortion that has become second nature to the police force in Nigeria was welcome.

Then, it was said that some elements in the police tried to resist that order, but the IGP stood firm, and Nigerians applauded even more. From goings on in Okota area of Lagos one could sense that elements opposed to the instilling of professionalism have now found ways to pervert it.

Sources in Okota confided in ceeceereports that checkpoints simply moved from the roads to the streets. The police now stay with them in the neighbourhood, harassing motorists, okada and keke drivers. After all said and done, hands must dip into pockets! The police doesn’t lose some would say. They report irritation from constant the ‘brawling noise’ and scuffle from uncouth elements in the police.

Many people got in touch with ceeceereports to pour out their grievances and experiences with the Okota Police. Police is your friend! Not so? Ikenna (surname withheld) early that morning was driving his fiancée, a student, to the bus stop from where she would use public transport to University of Lagos (Unilag). They were happily discussing the events that they want to define their future until, suddenly, a ‘danfo’ bus double-crossed them.

Screeching tires, screams and tremble that it could be ‘one chance’ type of robbers. The fear did not abate as the first set of gun-toting men that jumped down from the vehicle were on mufti. They started harassing, intimidating, pushing, searching, shouting obscenities. They thoroughly debased Ikenna. Ikenna is a graduate. He convinced his girl to proceed to school and let him take care of the issue.

Lagos State Commissioner of Police

 

They impounded his vehicle and promptly drove it to the Okota police station close to Chemist bus stop. Bundled him into their rickety danfo bus and forced him to take them to his house. Like worms they burrowed in his house leaving it like a madman’s den. Ikenna said they even threatened to break into his father’s room. Then they moved to his shop in front of the compound and carted away wines on the claim that they were fake wines.

Only a few witnesses could summon courage to come close. The policemen were up to ten in number, some on mufti, some regaled in bulletproof vests, some wielding handcuffs and big sticks, all toting guns, which combined to give the impression that Ikenna must be a member of a certain criminal gang.

Eye witnesses who said they asked the most noisy of the policemen to tell them what Ikenna did to warrant this treatment told ceeceereports that the officer simply said ‘he does not cooperate with us, he passes us every time but he does not cooperate.’ Thus they carted away the cartons of wine, allegedly telling sympathisers to come to the station if they want to help.

Ikenna himself said he knows the policemen who would sometimes stop him and ask for his papers. He said he was later granted bail for a sum of N20, 000, and the Okota police celebrated his ‘release’ with some bottles of the ‘fake’ wines.

Since this arrest, Ikenna has been arrested two more times by the same Okota police. That is within a space of two weeks which prompted him to contact ceeceereports.

Obi (surname withheld), another resident of Canal Estate, Okota told ceeceereports of how he was beaten black and blue by a team of policemen, on a Saturday morning while he left his house for morning exercise. Dressed in complete sports attire, the policemen asked him questions bothering from the bizarre to the downright idiotic. This kind of encounter ensued under a chaotic circumstance as Obi noted a stench of rancid breath (apologies Wole Soyinka) of stale liquor oozing from their mouths.

Police: where are you going?

Obi: jogging

Police: where is your ID card?

Obi: It’s at home

Police: what do you do for a living?

Obi: business

Police: what kind of business?

Obi: buying and selling

Police: call somebody to bring your ID card

Obi: oga I said am going to jog, my phone is at home, my wallet is at home

Then what followed was like; ‘are you teaching us police work?’ Then they ordered him to ‘enter motor’. When he attempted to insist on his rights, they launched mass beating on him under the pretext they were trying to arrest him. This stopped and they let him go when residents of the estate started to gather at the scene, but not without a warning that ‘we go still get you’.

Another person, Emmanuel (surname withheld) who spoke to ceeceereports said that on his day, he just visited a bank at the Ago Roundabout, after which he went to the nearby bus stop to hitch public transport to his destination. Lo and behold, the danfo bus he made to enter was those of the Okota police with about seven of them inside.

Lagos State Police Public relations Officer

They ordered him to continue and enter the bus that he is under arrest. He refused. Before he knew it, about seven others hanging around had encircled him trying to force him inside the bus. Emmanuel said some of them where putting their hands in his pocket in a manner that suggested they were searching him. He said that as he tried to know what some are doing with a part of his pocket, others would be dipping their hands in another part of his pocket.

He said that they only backed down when he threatened to petition the Lagos State Police Public relations Officer. He said that like juju, all of them jumped inside their bus cursing him and yelling obscenities at him as they drove off.

Well-meaning Nigerians say that the IGP must continue with the reform of the police especially as it regards grassroot policing in order to weed out bad eggs and negative policing. A policeman who spoke to ceeceereports on the condition of anonymity said ‘they will only transfer him (a policeman who involves in misdemeanour) if you report him. Maybe they may take him to Abuja and he will continue there.’