Lagos — Civil Liberties Organisation releases some details of extra- judicial killings by Lagos police command. It a controversial issue everyone talks about but government does nothing about.

Vitus Obi, a 32-year old casual worker at Stu-dio Press Nigeria plc, woke up from sleep December 4, 2000 a healthy man. He dressed up and made for his place of work. He was picked up by men of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad, SARS, of the Lagos State police command from his place of work. Ten days later, Obi was a dead man. He died as a result of injuries he sustained following severe torture by his captors.

Before he left SARS Ikeja, where he was detained, Obi had suffered paralysis. Obi's sin was that Benjamin, his younger brother had stolen the sum of N500,000 from Shoetide Nigeria Limited, Apapa. The boy was nowhere to be found, so Obi was arrested in his place.

Beatrice Illoh, a mother of nine children went to the place where she sells roast plantain at Alhaji Marsha Road, Surulere, December 23 to do her normal business. But she never returned. She was hit by a police bullet in controversial circumstances. While police claims she was killed in a crossfire between it and armed robbers, eye witnesses alleged that the police opened fire on a group of youths at a carnival. A stray bullet hit Illoh.

Peter, the aggrieved widower said his wife was not killed in any crossfire but by a policeman who jumped out of a moving taxi and shot a group of youths on carnival.

Such killings have pitched the Civil Liberties Organisation, CLO, against the police in Lagos State. CLO says the police is carrying out its duties as if the country is still in a military regime. At two different press conferences, the human rights group accused the police of reminding Nigerians of the dark days of Abacha's regime.

"The very reason why we must condemn these acts of extra-judicial killings is because it reminds us of the Abacha years when men in uniform killed and tortured innocent citizens with impunity, often times in connivance with the high and mighty in society," said Abdul Oroh, executive director, CLO.

The CLO also cited the case of Kalu Samuel Iroh, alias, Kiro, a 35- year old businessman at Tejuosho Market, Yaba, Lagos, murdered in cold blood at the Area C command headquarters, Surulere, Lagos, March 18. Kiro was arrested along with four others by six policemen for alleged impersonation. They were taken to the Area C command headquarters where he was mercilessly beaten and battered to death.

According to CLO, Kiro and the others arrested with him, were returning from Adeniran Ogunsanya Street, Surulere in a blue Peugeot 504 Salon car belonging to his friend, Frank Otonko of 20 Mobile police force, Ikeja, Lagos. They were intercepted around Makoko police station by six policemen in a police jeep. The policemen demanded their identities which they supplied with particulars of the car. The policemen were said to have neglected the mobile policeman's identity card, handcuffed them and took them back to the barracks police station.

While at the station, Kiro was said to have demanded to know why he was arrested and protested the way they were being manhandled by the police. The leader of the police team, according to CLO, vowed to deal with Kiro "since he thought he was a strong man."

His widow, Ngozi, was one of those arrested. She said her husband's head was broken leading to severe loss of blood. "His knee, ankle bones and ribs were shattered, and the beating continued until he became unconscious," she said.

She added that Kiro was refused bail for medical treatment by the police. She said they pleaded with the policemen to either get a doctor to attend to him in the cell or allow them to get one, but the investigating police officer, IPO (Andrew) refused and after much persistent pleadings from the relatives, he demanded a bribe of N60,000.00 before he could release him on bail. Since they couldn't raise the money demanded, Ude Samuel, a relative, pleaded with the IPO to detain him in the cell while Kiro be taken to hospital for treatment. The IPO refused. Pleas from Kiro's wife to see her husband were also turned down by the IPO.

According to Ude: "When the police were aware that Kiro had died in custody, they started playing us around." He said the cell inmates told him that Kiro had died and was already taken to the mortuary.

Otonko confirmed that he visited the station to ascertain what happened, but the IPO merely pointed at Kiro's corpse lying in a pool of his own blood at a corner near the cell. On further prodding, the IPO told him that "Kalu was an impersonator, he was a stubborn man who stabbed himself to death with broken louvres at the station."

In the case of Obi, he was arrested with his mother, Justina and Adindu, his cousin who was released after "N14,000.00 bribe" had been given. Justina said that while in the cell, she overheard her son crying in anguish from an inner chamber of the station where he was being tortured. Vitus was brought out paralysed after the torture and was placed on his mother's laps. Justina told Newswatch that when she spoke to her son and there was no response, she decided to inquire from the IPO what happened to him, but the IPO, she said, claimed that Vitus had been sick all night and that he had spent his personal money treating him.

The IPO allegedly asked the mother to bring N7,000 to take him on bail so that they could take him to a hospital for treatment. When Happiness, Vitus's sister eventually got the money, she took it to the IPO who insisted that only a man could sign the bail bond. That means that since Happiness is a woman, she cannot sign a bail bond.

Happiness said she ran to look for a man to sign the bail bond and in the course came across one Peter Okpara, (also a policeman at the station) who gave her a note to the IPO, which he refused to give attention to.

Vitus was taken to a private hospital, Lifelink Medical Centre at Idi Mangoro, Agege, Lagos, where he died. The doctor discovered that Vitus' hip bone and spinal cord were broken while there was also a deep wound beside his anus, which was decaying internally. His back was covered with blisters and bruises.

"The doctor also confirmed that he was permanently paralysed and that his heart was palpitating," CLO said.

The CLO is not only accusing the police of intimidating the family into running out of their 25, Talabi, Agege residence but also stalling the post mortem processes. Obi was hurriedly buried after his body started decaying.

CLO also mentioned the cases of Samuel Izah Oshimili who was shot dead at Ikeja and Ayuba Hamza Parakoyi, who was shot dead at the National Stadium, January 13 during a football match between Nigeria and Zambia during a scramble for Gulder T-shirts.

The human rights group insists that government should set up an investigation panel into the killings to punish the culprits and to work towards purging the Nigeria police of paranoid elements who present the police as enemies of the people rather than what they claim to be-friends of the people.

Mike Okiro, Lagos State police commissioner told Newswatch that the police is not engaging in extra-judicial killings. He attributed the increase in police killings to the frame of mind of certain policemen whom he described as suffering from the hangover of military regimes.

He said that he has ordered full scale investigation into the case of Vitus Obi, while Martin Maduagwu, the policeman that killed Illoh has been charged to Court 6 Ebute-Metta, Lagos. He said that he was still studying the case of Iroh "whose detail is still sketchy."

Besides, Okiro said he is organising lectures for his men to keep them in tune with the demands of the democratic dispensation. "Some of these boys have not witnessed democracy before. They need to be taught about what is required," he said. He said that the issue of stray bullet would not be totally out-ruled. "There is nothing we can do about it especially when they are engaged with robbers. The only thing people can do is to run away from crime or violent scenes," Okiro said.

Additional report by Geoffrey Ekenna.