We’ve all been in a variation of  this scenario: snarled up in a traffic jam for any length of time only to get to the top of the road and realise that the cause is another one of those illegal, mobile ‘toll gates’ set up by members of  the Nigerian Police Force in the guise of ‘stopping and searching’

The other day my brother in-law, who is on the other side of  60  was travelling along the Badagry Express way and got caught up in one of  those ridiculous jams— only to get to the top of the road to see that the cause was a check point manned by policemen (?) in mufti  no less; not stopping and searching much —but basically obtaining small change from commercial drivers and suspicious looking trucks (and this, in the face of  the Boko Haram menace).

On getting to his turn there was an exchange of words as the elderly man called them out, telling them ho-ha that this was NOT a check point, but an illegal toll-gate at which point they promptly arrested him and took him to their station. Apparently they thought they were dealing with a fragile old man…had they known.

As the story goes my brother in-law on getting to the station whipped up a mighty storm, and if you know the Doyles well, when necessary we can be LOUD. As the story goes he cursed the living daylights out of them calling them armed goons and every other name under the sun, in short this was his personal “OCCUPY NIGERIA” moment. Fortunately the DPO of said station possessed some gumption, (not a common trait for the average Nigerian policeman) and quickly diffused the situation, called his men to order and released my brother in law with an apology.

I have never seen such a large bunch of morons gathered in one place the same time. Are they living in an alternate universe? Now is really not the time to be aggravating the people. The populace is already on edge and really shouldn’t have to deal with their low level bullshit on top of everything else. You would think that given the times, members of the Nigerian police would be more circumspect especially as they seem to be the ones in the direct alone line of  fire.

In recent times how many policemen have been violently killed? In the past year alone, Boko Haram has done a great job of reducing the population of  the force. The less charitable would say good riddance to bad rubbish; the force needed cleansing anyway! The story was told of  how youths of a community came out to celebrate after one of those times the Boko Haram sacked a police station in Kano; the message is clear – the police is not their friend.

And is that why they go around in mufti… to be able to melt into the crowd in the event of an uprising? There is nothing as disconcerting as coming upon a rag-tag group of  dishevelled looking, gun toting men at a check point with little or no identification but their guns. I say the policemen were lucky that this time… .

They need to know that the people are angry and on edge and any little thing can tip us over the edge. Today, it’s an elderly man… one day their going to take on a hot blooded young man with a pump action under his seat and the exchange will not be heated words!