Oluwatosin Obajemu
The Lagos State Police Command has arrested four policemen and three Lagos State Traffic Management Agency officials for trying to extort over N75, 000 from a citizen.
In a statement made available by the Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, CSP Chike Oti, he said; “The attention of the Commissioner of Police, Lagos State Command, was drawn to a publication on page 19 of The Nation Newspaper captioned; “Police as cesspit of corruption”.
“The reporter drew attention to the underhand dealings of some policemen he ran into on his way to Festac town Lagos. He alleged that the men took him to First Gate of Festac Town which they have turned to an extortion point.”
CSP Chike said that the information led to the immediate investigation which led to the arrest of the culprits. “Sequel to the information from the publication, the CP directed the Area Commander in-charge of Area E, Festac, ACP Yusuf Ajape and the officer in charge of the Command X-Squad Section, SP Aliu Abubakar, to carry out a covert operation around the aforementioned location leading to the arrest of the following policemen and Lagos State Traffic Management Agency officials.”
The arrested policemen includes: Inspector Charles Omokaro, Inspector Idara Akai, Sergeant Chidi Mordi and Sergeant Joseph Bernard. Also, the arrested LASTMA officials were Mr. Sam Adekunle, Mr. Omolaja Ige and Mrs. Modinat Folashade.
According to the statement, the culprits were trying to extort N75, 000 from the victim.
“They were caught trying to extort one Mr. Waheed Lamidi, whom they gave a Diamond bank account number 0020558133; titled Femi Adebanji to transfer the sum of seventy-five thousand naira only when he complained that he had no cash.”
The Commissioner of Police Lagos, Imohimi Edgal has directed that the suspects be brought to the Command Headquarters, X-Squad section, for thorough investigation and appropriate disciplinary action if found guilty.
In the same vein, the CP said the Command will always welcome opinions, comments and criticism geared towards helping the force to get rid of bad eggs in its midst and improve service delivery and not comments designed to debase or ridicule the force.