Two policemen were on Sunday morning killed by
armed robbers in the Ejigbo and Orile Iganmu areas of Lagos State.
The robbers killed a police inspector in Ejigbo
while a corporal was killed in Orile Iganmu in the separate incidents. Three
other policemen were injured in the attack in Orile-Iganmu.
Also on Sunday, armed robbers laid siege to Regal
Seaview Estate, Lekki, Lagos, and ransacked houses for about an hour.
It was learnt that the robbers, numbering over
20, besieged the estate at about 12:25am in four vehicles.
Eyewitnesses said the robbers, who drove into the
estate in a Honda, Toyota Sienna mini-bus, a black Prado jeep and a Hilux van,
were armed with various sophisticated weapons.
It was learnt that some of the robbers mounted
roadblocks at Elf Junction and Ikate Roundabout which serve as access routes
into the community while the operation lasted.
One of the security guards attached to the
estate, who identified himself simply as Emmanuel, said the attack seemed like
a war.
He said no sooner had he opened the gate for a
resident that the robbers, who had already taken position in the area, took
control of the gate from him and gained entry.
He said, “Four of the robbers came down from the
vehicles and flung the gate open. They subsequently drove the vehicles into the
estate and seized me. The other guard who was manning the gate with me
abandoned the duty post and ran into the estate.
“They asked if there were riot policemen in the
estate and directed me to point at houses occupied by rich men. When I declined
to tell them, two of them who were asked to stay with me beat me mercilessly
and hit me with gun butts and also threatened to kill me.”
He said the robbers then moved from house to
house before policemen attached to the residence of a retired Deputy Inspector
General of Police in the area tried to resist them but were later overpowered
by the bandits.
PUNCH Metro learnt that the policemen
attached to the DIG’s residence quickly radioed Maroko Police Division and the
Rapid Response Squad for reinforcement.
It was gathered that policemen in six vans and an
Armoured Personnel Carrier were deployed in the estate. However, the robbers
who had got wind of the development started shooting sporadically into
different directions.
A resident, Ifeanyi Eze, said an attempt by the
policemen to block the entrance of the gate with the APC was rebuffed by the
robbers.
He said, “The fatalities would have been much if
not that the policemen in the other six vehicles stayed behind and allowed the
APC to attack first. The APC came under intense fire.
“The policemen exchanged gunfire with them but
this didn’t have much effect as they were not given the chance to strategise
and forge a coordinated attack. As a result of this, they had to turn back and
fled the scene. This gave the robbers the leeway to escape with their loot.”
“I last heard the kind of sounds of the gunshots
when I was in the Niger Delta creeks,” a bar owner, who wished to be identified
simply as Iya Ibadan, said.
The windscreen of the APC marked RRS 287 LA was
riddled with bullets and was said to have developed a major fault as a result
of the incident.
Meanwhile, one of the shots from the robbers hit
a middle aged man, Tirinmisiyu Afolabi, who lives in an uncompleted building
adjacent to the estate.
Afolabi said he was sleeping when he suddenly
heard sporadic gunshots. He said before he knew it, he had been hit by a stray
bullet after the building was hit severally.
Our correspondent who visited the estate observed
that the gate of the estate and it’s security post were riddled with bullets.
Also, no fewer than 10 houses on the estate were bullet-ridden.
Two dogs that were released by their owners
during the attack were also shot by the rampaging robbers and are receiving
treatment at a veterinary clinic.
One of the victims described the guns wielded by
the bandits as “standard military issued weapons” which are unconventional. He
said the robbers fired about a thousand times while the incident lasted.
He said, “They were five in number in our house
and were fully armed; they immediately matched me and my mother to her room and
started ransacking everywhere.
‘’When we could not give them the American
dollars they asked for, they made away with three laptops, my mum’s jewellery
and, unfortunately, her wedding ring.”
In Ejigbo, the policemen were said to have
responded to a distress call when the robbers engaged them in a gun duel. It
was learnt that one of the robbers was killed in the ensuing gunfire while the
inspector died at the hospital after sustaining gunshot injuries.
The Orile Iganmu incident happened at the Orile
Iganmu interchange bridge at about 3.30 am.
Confirming the killings of the policemen, the
Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, Ngozi Braide, said a
pump-action gun was recovered at the scene of the Ejigbo incident while an AK
47 rifle with 20 rounds of live ammunition were recovered in Orile Iganmu.
“In all, two policemen were killed, three of them
were wounded while two of the robbers were also killed. However, the other
robbers escaped with gunshot wounds,” she said.
On the Lekki robbery, Braide said she had yet to
be briefed on the incident promising to get back to our correspondent as soon
as she had the details.
The Punch
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