By ALBERT AKPOR

We are tired of this kind of policing. Is this the way to police a community; incessantly raiding and harassing innocent persons, extorting and manhandling hapless people? No. I do not think this is how policemen should behave towards those they are supposed to protect and safeguard.

We have had several DPOs in this community and none was as arrogant, carefree and unprofessional as the present one. If this continues, we will stage a protest and let the world know what we are going through.”

Those were agonizing lamentations of a restaurant owner along old Ojo road, Agboju, Lagos who simply identified herself as Madam Lizzy. Curiously, Madam Lizzy is not the only one caught in the alleged dragnet of men and officers of Satellite police station, Agboju under the leadership of Superintendent of Police (SP), Akinola Adamu.

Investigation revealed that for the past two years, residents, motorists, Okada riders and, of course, business owners operating within the area have suffered untold hardship in the hands of gullible and overzealous policemen who allegedly are acting on the instructions of their DPO.

Looking for criminals

Some of the victims who narrated their ordeal lamented to Crime Alert that the DPO, exhibits over zealousness in the discharge of his official duties.

According to them, every night, policemen carry out random raids on restaurants and social joints in the guise of looking for criminals. Said Mr. Oke, a spare parts seller at First gate, “If you look around you will discover that what I sell and which everybody sell here are second hand tires and other motor spare parts. My shop is so small that it cannot occupy more than two persons. But every now and then, policemen from Agboju would storm shops along this line as if we are criminals.

They would ransack the shops, turn everything upside down and sometimes, cart away tires and take you along to the station. At the station, you are asked to secure your bail with N5,000 each.

God help you if you claim to know the DPO, it is then that your problem becomes compounded. Once you are at the station, you can never be right. The reason they normally give us is that, some criminals use our shops as hideouts, and one wonders how that could be true.”

The alleged notoriety of the DPO and his men assumed a frightening dimension last week when a popular joint along Marwa road was raided by the police , ostensibly in search of ‘criminals’.

Everybody, including the owner of the shop and those who had come to relax after the day’s hard job, were hauled into a waiting van and driven to the station. At the station right before the DPO, everybody was declared a suspect.

A staff of one of the banks along the Old Ojo road was among the ‘suspects.’ Each person was asked to identify and secure his bail with N5,000.00. whether he has a credible means of livelihood or not.

The banker who refused to give his names said he was not spared even when he identified himself as such. One of the victims, a truck driver narrated his ordeal including how he was tagged a member of the dreaded Islamic group, Boko Haram so as to extort money from him.

The truck driver who identified himself as Garba Usman and spoke in pidgin English said, “That night, Friday last week, after the close of work, I went to Madam…restaurant along Marwa road to have a bottle of beer before going to bed because I am a truck driver.

While at the bar, suddenly a commercial bus rolled by and men in mufti armed with riffles alighted and asked everybody not to move. Initially, I thought they were armed robbers but they later identified themselves as policemen from Agboju and I felt a sense of relief.

Before long, we were asked to stand in a single file to enter the vehicle. Because the vehicle was full, they hijacked another vehicle also in Lagos commercial color which conveyed the rest of us to their station.

There at the station, we were asked to identify ourselves. I told them that I am a truck driver and even brought out my identity card but one of them, very black and short, I can identify him any day if they decide to do identification parade, accused me of being a member of Boko Haram. I tried to let him know that I am from Jos and even a christian; but he said no, that I must enter cell. We were about 22 in number.

Those who were able to pay their way through, were let off the hook. But some of us including myself slept in the cell till the following day. I saw somebody who looked to me as their DPO and I tried to approach him but he ignored me and said “go and settle yourself.”

Another victim of the unprofessional conduct of policemen from the division, a motorist who gave his name as Princewill, told Crime Alert that he has never been humiliated and harassed like he suffered recently in the hands of these men in black who are masquerading as policemen.

According to the motorist, “I was returning from work last Wednesday at about 10.00pm and just at the front of the police station, I was flagged to a halt by some policemen and I complied.

One of them bent over me to say I was driving recklessly and I felt embarrassed. I told him that I could not have been driving recklessly because, to start with, I was tired after the day’s job and was sluggishly driving home to go and rest. He roared that I should open my boot which I did. He spotted some documents and asked if I was a lawyer and I said no.

He went further to ask what were the contents of a bag in the boot and I replied that he has the right to open the bag and see for himself. Just because of that statement, he became angry and ordered me to park properly and follow him to the station.

At the station, I say a young man of average height who I later learn t to be the DPO. I went to him in an attempt to narrate my ordeal but what I got was shocking.

“Go away and settle yourself with the officer that brought you here, or did I arrest you. That is how you people normally behave, may be because you know me as the DPO, you want to show off,” he shouted at me. I had no alternative than to meet with the man that actually brought me there and settle with N5,000.00 for doing nothing.”

But even in the face of this harassment and extortion from policemen, men of the underworld are having a field day in the entire area. It was learn t that shops and stalls along the old Ojo road have been continuously attacked while valuables including cash carted away. Last Monday, a supermarket very close to the station by NEPA office was attacked by six armed men and goods running into thousands of naira were carted away.