April 12, 2020: Nigerian police officers man a checkpoint in Lagos | Pius Utomi Ekpei/AFP via Getty Images AWKA, Nigeria – The proprietor of a well-known radio and television station in Lagos barely avoided death following a run-in with soldiers on the Idemili-Nnobi road in Anambra State. The incident happened while he was traveling to Asaba Airport in Delta State with three members of the nation’s secret police, the Department of State Services, or DSS officers.CONTINUE FULL READING>>>>>
According to the media tycoon, whose name has been kept anonymous, the troops accused him and his friends of kidnapping even though the DSS officers had shown their official IDs. A Near Death Experience “I can say that we just barely avoided death,” the trembling media owner recalled.
“I went to the DSS headquarters after leaving my village in Awka to have a few officers escort me to Asaba Airport. Around 12:30 in the afternoon, we arrived in Nnobi when a military patrol car betrayed us and told us to pull off the road because we appeared to be kidnappers. They were allegedly manhandled by the soldiers and made to lie on the road. When the media mogul’s DSS officers showed their identity cards, the troops allegedly rejected them as fraudulent.
The media magnate claimed that as the soldiers primed their rifles, seemingly prepared to kill the group, the situation worsened. “We were saved by their boss’s arrival,” he claimed. “We would have perished by now if not.” Bringing Up Concerns About Innocent Murders Concerns regarding military operations in the South East of Nigeria, a region plagued by insecurity and regular conflicts between security forces and armed groups, have increased as a result of the occurrence.
Dismayed by the soldiers’ conduct, the media mogul said that they were a reflection of the region’s tendency to wrongly target innocent individuals. “This encounter just made me more aware of the South East’s high rate of innocent deaths. He said, “They wanted to kill us even though we had the right identification.”
Growing Tensions in the South East In recent years, there have been reports of extrajudicial executions and security forces violating human rights in the South East. Civil society organizations have repeatedly demanded more accountability and control over military operations in the area.
The incident raises new concerns regarding the protocols and training of military personnel on patrol, even though the patrol leader’s intervention in this instance saved a tragic outcome. Demands of Accountability The incident serves as a reminder that security agencies must be cautious and follow due process when interacting with civilians.
Both people and advocacy groups are calling on the government to conduct a comprehensive investigation into the incident and make sure that it doesn’t happen again. The Nigerian Army has not responded to the accusations, and the DSS has not yet released an official statement on the subject.
The media tycoon’s story, however, is a sobering reminder of the unstable security conditions in some regions of Nigeria, where misidentification can have deadly repercussions.CONTINUE FULL READING>>>>>
