They are dissenting voices laden with frustrations. These are coming from commercial and private car owners in a Lagos community.
The distraught motorists are lamenting alleged extortions by the men of the police force, particularly during the curfew.
No thanks to the coronavirus pandemic that has been ravaging the world in no small proportion, which gave rise to the curfew as announced by President Mohammadu Buhari.
A commercial driver, plying between Ile-Iwe and Ile-Epo in Agbado Oke-Odo Local Council Development Area (LCDA), Mr. Adebayo Ogunbi told the reporter that the police have cashed into the situation to milk motorists dry of their hard-earned money.
He lamented that police extortion and harassment was his greatest nightmare during this period. He called on the authorities to keep a close tab on the security agents sent to roadblocks during the period of the curfew, that last between 8:00 p.m. and 6:00 a.m.
In his words, the policemen were the greatest beneficiaries of the coronavirus crisis. He said that the security men were out there to further frustrate commercial drivers who are legitimately struggling to eke out a living for themselves.
He stated that, over any little thing, they will flag drivers down. According to him, their prayer is for commercial drivers to stay just one minute past 8pm, and then, they will begin to threaten fire and brimstone.
His words: “On many occasions, they had asked me to produce a pass that authorised me to go out. There was a day that there was a heavy traffic on the route. It was obvious that people would still be in the traffic till 9pm. But the police arrested immediately me after the traffic and insisted that they will not allow me to go home since I don’t have the pass. I was held there for more than 30 minutes.
“There was a day that they stopped me at Ekoro Junction at about 2,30pm. They delayed me for more than two hours. My offence, according to them, was that the two passengers I carried sat close to each other at the back seat. That was the first time I heard from the police that I am supposed to monitor how my passengers comport themselves.
“At the end of the day, and after making several calls to who I know, they still collected N1,000 from me. Meanwhile, I have only worked N1,400 that very day. It is frustrating because they must see one way or the other to collect money from you.”
He also recurred that there was a day some defiant officers arrested him and requested that he pays N5,000, else he would remain there at the checkpoint with them, and would be taken to the station later in the midnight. He said he couldn’t pay the money but didn’t leave the checkpoint without parting with something.
Another commercial driver plying Iyana-Iba and Agbara route, who identified himself simply as Monday, told the reporter that the policemen on the axis has no other business other than to collect N100 and N200 from commercial motorists.
“Whether it is during or outside the curfew, all they are after is that money that you will give them. They don’t hide it. Some of them will position someone in mufti to be collecting the money. But many of them will collect it themselves even in the presence of passengers,” he said.
The state government has been inundated with complaints of extortions on Lagos roads by different officials who are said to be allegedly extorting money from residents in the name of enforcing the curfew order.
A journalist with a national newspaper, Braide Kings, also narrated how he was stopped at Adeniji Jones in Ikeja. He said that even after introducing himself as a journalist, the policemen still smartly collected N500 from him for allegedly flouting a traffic light at the axis.
According to one Isiaka Gbolahan: “I had a harrowing encounter with some policemen at a checkpoint at Egbe bus stop along Ikotun Road on my way back home from where my wife and I went to buy foodstuff at the Ikotun market. Despite showing my ID card as a journalist to one of them, a policewoman, who was among other three policemen, insisted she was taking me to the police station for flouting the lockdown order because according to her my wife was supposed to be at home observing the lockdown order.
“She ordered my wife to come down from the front seat as she entered and told me to turn back that she was taking us to the police station, that was despite her colleagues’ advice to allow us go. Even when I told her to give me back my ID card, she said that would be sorted out when we get to the station. It later dawned on me to ask her the reason why she was taking us to the station and that if the government instructed them not to allow people to go to market to purchase foodstuff.
“It was later she came down from the car and asked me to open the car boot for her to check if there were food items as I acclaimed before she released my ID to me and told me to go. At the same junction others who were coming from the market were also harassed. While those who know their right where let off the hook, others were made to drop money before they were allowed to go.”
Perturbed with the development, not long ago, five court officials were arrested by Inspector-General of Police Monitoring Unit deployed to Lagos and Ogun States for parading themselves as officers of Lagos State Environmental Sanitation Enforcement Agency, popularly called ‘Task Force’ for extorting motorists and residents over the use of face mask in the state.
Meanwhile, the Lagos State police command said it arrested no fewer than 2,310 violators of the lockdown directive during the first five weeks period. It has also impounded 2,092 vehicles, 1535 motorcycles and 369 tricycles. Spokesman of the command, Bala Elkana, made this known.
