Mr Fatai Alao, before the attack
A
robbery incident at Aregbesola area of Agbado Crossing in Ifo Local
Government Area of Ogun State, on Thursday morning, left four persons
with gunshot injuries, with two of them in a critical condition.
Residents said the armed robbers, who
were 12 in number, stormed Shonibare Crescent and Oyekola Street in the
area at 1am and raided four houses. According to the residents, the
robbers also carted away cash, jewellery, and handsets. In one of the
houses, a Brazillian-styled (face to face) building, the robbers raided
seven out of its eight apartments. At least, eight of the assailants
were reportedly armed with guns, machetes and sticks. Two of the
casualties, Mr. Fatai Alao, a butcher, and Mr. Ubana Eta, who is
unemployed, were both shot in the face by the assailants, and are lying
in critical condition at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital,
Idi-Araba. The others are a baker, who was identified as Mr. lsiaka and
an unidentified man. Both men were shot in their arms, but Isiaka was
reportedly discharged on Friday from the Lagos State University Teaching
Hospital, Ikeja, where he had received treatment, while the other
injured person was referred to the National Orthopaedic Hospital,
Igbobi, from the hospital.
In the bedroom of the Alaos, the bedspread and the floor were wet with blood, while the room appeared to have been ransacked, Saturday PUNCH observed.
Since the incident, the residents of the
area have been apprehensive, with many of them expressing their anger
and sadness over the situation.
Alao’s wife, Mrs. Bola Alao, a petty trader, who spoke to Saturday PUNCH
on the phone from LUTH, on Friday, where she was staying with her
husband, said Alao’s condition could worsen if she failed to raise N160,
000 within the day.
Speaking in tears, Bola said, “We have
done so many tests already including an X-ray, but we’ve just been told
to do some more medical tests and buy some things, which will cost N160,
000. We cannot afford it and I don’t know who or where to turn to for
assistance. It is causing delay and they won’t attend to him again until
we are able to raise the money and do the necessary things. We didn’t
even struggle with the robbers; they asked for money and we gave them
what we had and my jewellery.”
Residents of the neighbourhood stood in clusters, talking about the incident in a gloomy mood when Saturday PUNCH
visited the community on Friday. The residents said the robbers, who
were all youths in their 20s, threatened to “waste their victims” during
the attack.
Alao’s landlord, Mr. Idowu Shonibare,
said, “The oldest member of the gang could not have been older than 25
years. They broke the main entrance door and started breaking into each
room, one after the other. They were calling each other by crazy names
like Supo, Mopo, Ogidiga and so on.
“They shot Alao here and left our
building for the next one. They shot two other persons on the street and
another man on Oyekola Street . They also beat some people up with the
flat side of their machetes and sticks.”
Eta’s 12 year-old daughter, Gloria, who also spoke to Saturday PUNCH amidst tears, recalled how her father was shot in the presence of his wife and five children.
Gloria said, “Only one of the robbers
came into our place. He came in and saw us (children) first. He asked
for our parents but we were all too scared to reply. When none of us
could say anything, he started shouting that he would kill somebody here
today if our parents didn’t come out. That woke my father and when he
came out from the room, he asked the robber ‘what do you want? That was
the last thing he said as the man pointed his gun at him and shot him in
the face.”
Gloria said she felt “great sadness” as a
result of the incident, adding that she and her younger ones were being
taken care of by their uncle, Mr. Sunday Eta, in the absence of their
mother who was with their father at the hospital.
Another resident, a nursing mother with a
one-month-old baby, Mrs. Bowotola Ebenezer, said one of the robbers
threatened to blow her baby’s head with a gun, when the hoodlums broke
into their room.
Ebenezer who described the experience as
“traumatic”, said her husband quickly gave the robbers the N10, 000
they had at home and begged them not to do anything rash.
“I was really scared when the man said
he would kill my child. The robbers also collected N30,000 from one of
our neighbours,” she said.
Concerning Alao’s situation, his landlady, Mariam Shonibare, told Saturday PUNCH that
the community members had started to raise funds for the victims of the
incident, particularly for Alao, who needed money urgently.
She, however, added that the community would still need outside assistance to raise the required amount.
She said, “We have started going around
the community to see what we can get from everyone but it’s a poor
community, so we are open to anyone who can assist us save the life of
Alao. He needs money to survive and the wife has tried all she can.”
The incident also brought emergency
response in the country, particularly regarding security and health,
into question. Alao’s landlord, Mr. Idowu Shonibare, who was part of the
team that took the victims to the hospital, described their experience
as ‘very terrible”.
He said, “We first took them to the
General Hospital, Ifako-Ijaiye, but surprisingly, the nurse we met there
did not care at all. She turned us back and did not bother to give the
victims anything or show any concern. She told us that there were others
who had come before us and also did not get treated. She rudely asked
us to leave and added that if the doctor should meet us there, we
wouldn’t last a second before he would send us out.”
From there, Shonibare said the rescue
team took the victims to the LASUTH, Ikeja, where there were no beds
available for the victims.
He said, “They tried at LASUTH because
they quickly attended to the victims and gave them treatment. However,
it was only one of them that they asked to stay, the three others were
transferred to LASU and the Orthopaedic Hospital, Igbobi.”
In his account, the Group Chairman,
Aregbesola Community Development Association, Mr. Edward Olatunji, said
that the police did not arrive until about two hours after calls were
made to them.
He said, “We heard the police siren in
the area like they were on patrol after about two hours that the robbers
had left. This is my 29th year in this area and I had never experienced
anything like that robbery incident. Even the private vigilante
security outfit in the community ran away because they couldn’t
withstand the firepower of the robbers.”
However, Ogun State Police Public Relations Officer, Muyiwa Adejobi, in a phone conversation with Saturday PUNCH, said the Police Commissioner, Ikemefuna Okoye, had “ordered full investigation into the matter.”
He, however, added that the police did
not arrive at the crime scene on time because the distress call that was
made to them came late.
He said, “In Ogun, we respond swiftly to
distress calls, but the police did not get the call on time. However,
steps will be taken to curtail such in future. The CP has directed the
Area Commander, Otta to do proper investigation. Since it was a robbery
incident, the matter will also be transferred to the State Criminal
Investigation Department and based on their report, the police might
need to strengthen their presence in the area.”
PUNCH
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