Upper Iweka under bridge: How Police sacked criminals, mounted extortion checkpoints, by motorists, commuters

By Nwabueze Okonkwo

In Onitsha, the Upper Iweka flyover bridge on the busy Onitsha-Awka express road used to be a notorious spot in the commercial capital of Anambra State. It was dreaded for the criminal activities that happened there, including violent armed robbery.

Over the past years, the entire circumference of the bridge was simply a den of robbers, kidnappers, car and bag snatchers, and other criminal elements. It also illegally served as a place where beggars and those living with disabilities converged to beg for their daily bread.

Many people, residents and visitors alike, fell victims one time or another, some losing their lives, some getting wounded, others losing money and other valuables.

The security situation under the bridge was no doubt a serious concern to the successive governments in Anambra State. And every one of them made a lot of effort to tackle the menace and sanitize the place, and they indeed succeeded. The place is today relatively secure.

But motorists and commuters in the city are now complaining bitterly of the illegal activities by security operatives, particularly the Police, around the bridge. They accused the Police of sacking criminals and mounting extortion checkpoints to dispossess them of their hard-earned money.

After displacing the criminals under and on top of the bridge, the policemen who are deployed from different formations such as Okpoko, Onitsha Area Command, Anti-Kidnapping/Rapid Response Squad, AKS/RRS, Anti-Crime Patrol, Highway Patrol, IGP/CP Monitoring Unit, among others, according to the complaints, converted the check-points established to checkmate criminals, to extortion points.

Investigations, however, revealed that the Police hierarchy in the state meant well in establishing the check-points, but some of the bad eggs among the operatives converted the areas into extortion check-points, to the extent that they force their victims, particularly private car owners, to cough out as much as between N200,000 and N500,000, as the case may be.

Their modus operandi, it was learned, is to stop a commercial vehicle or any motorist, try to find a fault with the vehicle particulars, and collect between N200 and above. In the case of private car owners, they demand for vehicle particulars, and even if they are complete, they demand some obscure documents like police extract, tinted glass permit, and others to nail them, failing which they capitalize on the inability to provide them and tag the vehicle a ‘stolen’ one.

These illegalities were rampant between January and April this year, when many private car owners complained about the extortion by the policemen using various tactics. Some were extorted right within the check-points, after accusing them of being in possession of stolen vehicles, and those who couldn’t produce cash were taken to nearby POS operators from where the agreed amount are withdrawn instantly or transferred to a certain account allegedly belonging to them.

One case was brought to the limelight sometime in March this year when the policemen accosted a certain private car owner, accused him of being in possession of a stolen vehicle, and extorted as much as N200,000 from him on the spot. However, when the man got home and informed his wife of his encounter with the policemen, his wife went berserk and contacted her brother, who is a serving senior police officer in Abuja.

After narrating her story to her police brother, he instructed her to go with her husband to the nearby Police Divisional Headquarters at Okpoko to verify whether the erring officers were from the Division or not.

When she got to the Okpoko Divisional Headquarters and informed the Divisional Police Officer in charge of the Division, the DPO, in a swift reaction, deployed some officers to go to the spot with her and her husband to identify the officers involved in the extortion saga.

On identifying the erring officers who incidentally were not from Okpoko Division but from Highway Patrol, the policemen deployed by the DPO asked the extortionists to refund the money with immediate effect or follow them to the station to see the DPO.

Out of frustration, they refunded the money to the woman and her husband, but when the video of the extortion went viral and drew the attention of Police authorities in the state and Zone 13 Headquarters at Ukpo, the DPO was directed to arrest the erring officers and bring them to the State Police Headquarters in Awka for proper interrogation.

The DPO arrested the officers and took them to Awka, where they were allegedly detained and subjected to an Orderly Room Trial, after which they were allegedly said to have been ferried to Force Headquarters, Abuja, for proper disciplinary actions, as directed by authorities at the Force Headquarters.

While the dust raised by the incident was about to settle, a similar incident occurred when another team of policemen from Onitsha Area Command allegedly extorted another car owner of a whooping sum of N250,000, after accusing him of being in possession of a stolen Toyota Highlander.

According to an eyewitness, the policemen who were at the same check-point under the Upper Iweka flyover bridge had on March 7, this year, demanded the vehicle particulars from the owner and when he produced the particulars at his disposal, including the purchasing receipt, insurance and other vital documents, they asked of his police extract but when he could not produce that, one of the policemen entered the vehicle and ordered him to drive straight to the Area Command Headquarters, Onitsha.

On getting there, they collected the vehicle key and his phone from him, threatened to detain him as one caught in possession of a stolen vehicle if he failed to give them N500,000.

Being helpless and out of fear, the vehicle owner initially offered N10,000, and they allegedly nearly slapped the hell out of him for the insult. When he offered N20,000, N50,000, N100,000, N200,000, they mocked him until he arrived at N250,000 bribe, they took him to a nearby POS operator and withdrew the sum from his account before allowing him to go with his ‘stolen’ vehicle.

A few weeks later, he contacted his lawyer, who wrote a strongly worded petition to both the Area Commander, the CP, AIG in charge of Zone 13, and the IGP. On getting the petition, the Area Commander, who was just newly posted to Onitsha, immediately directed the policemen to refund the amount. They were said to have taken the victim to the same nearby POS where the amount was returned to the man’s account.

In all, while inhabitants and the Onitsha business community are praising the Police for sacking the criminals from the spots and at the same time minimizing crime rate in the commercial city in particular and the entire state in general, they are also calling on the Police hierarchy in the state to maintain zero-tolerance against extortion.

The State Commissioner of Police, Ikioye Orutugu, had at various fora, warned his men against extorting innocent public and concentrate on providing utmost security in the state.

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