Three policemen attached to the
Sango Otta Police Station in Ogun
State on Saturday evening caused
a commercial bus to hit a waiting
passenger, killing her.
The policemen were making an illegal
demand of N50, which the driver was
not willing to pay.
Eye witnesses told SaharaReporters the
incident occurred at about 8.30pm on
Saturday at the foot of Sango bridge,
which runs in front of the police station.
They said the three policemen, who
have not been identified, harassed the
driver into a dangerous speed which led
to his hitting the passenger, who was
waiting for a bus. The victim, who
began to bleed profusely, was ignored
by the policemen as they continued to
chase the bus to collect the N50 they
were trying to extort from the driver.
One of the witnesses, a trader who sells
electronics at the POWA shopping
complex attached to the police station,
disclosed that it was not unusual or the
policemen to harass innocent drivers at
the bus stop to collect their illegal N50
charge or to hijack busses from
commercial operators for their own
purposes.
“It is not new. They do this every time,
scaring bus drivers with guns to extort
N50 from them. Sometimes they hijack
busses whenever they see one that is
empty so that they use it to operate
deceptively and extort other buses,”
the witness said.
The victim, identified simply as Mrs.
Lawal, reportedly bled for more than
one hour before a passer-by who
recognized her sent a message to her
children. One of them hurried to the
scene with his friends to find his mother
dying helplessly.
The deceased’s son, Mr. Feyi Lawal, told
our correspondent that his friends who
went to the scene with him assisted to
take his mother to Rubi hospital, a
private medical center near the
accident scene. They were however
later referred to the government’s
“General hospital” due to the severity
of her injuries.
Feyi said his mother gave up just before
she could receive any treatment at the
General hospital.
A female police officer who attended to
Feyi and his friends at the station on
Sunday when they visited to make
report, took Feyi’s statement but
denied him the right to include in the
statement a complaint about the police
harassment which led to the accident,
which was written down by herself.
Writing the statement by herself, she
claimed it was a ‘hit-and-run’ driver. All
witnesses however debunked claims by
the police, insisting that the accident
was caused by extortionist policemen.
“They are always the first to come out
and help victims of accidents, but
because they caused this one
themselves, they hid their faces in their
station and left the victim to die,” said
an eyewitness.
“It is either they wanted to take his bus
for their illegal operation or they
wanted their usual illegal N50. But it is
most likely they wanted to take his bus
because I noticed the bus was empty,”
another witness said.
He added that the bus drove
dangerously in order to escape the gun-
wielding policemen. He also alluded to
another recent occasion where a police
officer accidentally shot bullet on
himself in a delicate point near his own
jugular after hitting his service gun on a
bus conductor in demanding N50.
On that incident, he pointed out that
the policeman was negligently using his
gun to hit the bus conductor, somehow
oblivious of the fact that its nuzzle was
close to his own throat. The gun
accidently fired, and the bullet allegedly
shattered the neck of the police officer.
According to him, colleagues of the
erring police officer then arrested the
conductor, although he was clearly
innocent.
Said a woman who trades in front of the
police station, “I really don’t know why,
but the police own vans which officers
could use for their operations; why force
buses that are working on their own to
do illegal police operation?”
The witnesses also said policemen in
Sango Otta are notorious for arresting
people who have committed no
offences, only take them to the station
and demand bail money and “DPO’s
fee” of N5,000.
“They work with touts under the bridge.
Those touts also arrest people that
urinate and demand bail. But we are
surprised that they won’t arrest those
polluting the wall with ruling party’s
posters since they claim they are
arresting polluters,” another witness
volunteered, pointing at the walls of the
bridge littered with campaign posters of
the ruling party in Ogun State, the All
Progressives Congress.
“They are all thugs; the government
agencies, police and the touts. They
work together to harrass people,”
asserted a resident, who pleaded
anonymity.
“Well, Sango has become more
notorious. But what we fear even most
now is the police because they can kill
for just N50,” another resident at
Temidire bus stop said.
A citizen journalist was arrested in
Sango during the period that the bridge
was under construction. The young
journalist was taking photograph of
policemen who were seizing bikes for
no offence and extorting them.
Although there are conflicting views as
to whether the police eventually
arrested the vehicle that was chased
into a waiting crowd, sources close to
the station unanimously agreed that
the police would merely demand money
from the driver if they get him, and
then shield him from families of the
deceased.
Some members of the family of Mrs.
Lawal have indicated that they may sue
the police over her death.
Source: www.daillybook..com/2013/11/irresponsible-nigeria-policemen-cause.html?m=1

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Angry mobs no dey una end ?...make una borrow from lagos na...make dem teach doz agbero police some lessons

Nigerian police force again!


Whenever I come across them, I feel like throwing up!


They make my skin crawl!!!