Juliana Francis
A lady, Fatimah Babashehu Liman, has
taken to Facebook to narrate how policemen attached to Special Anti-Robbery
Squad (SARS), Federal Capital Territory Command, shot and abandoned her cousin,
Mr. Sadiq Ibrahim Abubakar to his fate.
According to Lima, the SARS men, on
May18, at about 1:pm, jumped the fence and entered her aunt's house in Gwarinpa,
Abuja, and started shooting.
She said: “Sadiq was performing ablution
for Zuhr prayers and when he sighted one of the officers shooting, he thought
they were robbers. Out of fear, he jumped into their neighbour's house. One of
the officers shot him on the hand and he started bleeding. He was handcuffed
and taken away in the police van, along with their neighbour's sons.”
She narrated that the remaining
policemen broke the doors in to the house, brought out some boys, the aunt and
husband, and started beating them. After beating them, the victims were whisked
away. Some of the policemen returned to the scene, to pick bullet shells and
left.
It was later discovered that the victims
were all taken to SARS office at Guzape. Lima said: “On reaching there, they
took us to see one of the heads of the office. The officer explained that the
officers were chasing a kidnapper, who had demanded a ransom. He said that the
kidnapper jumped into my aunt's house. They also denied shooting anybody. They
claimed that Sadiq got injured by a barbed wire while trying to escape, and
then, they said Sadiq was the kidnapper. After narrating our own side of the
story, the officer realised there were some hidden facts. After further
listening to Sadiq’s mom, the officer instructed that everyone should be
released.”
Lima said that another trouble started
after she demanded that the policemen should take Sadiq to the hospital and
pick the bill.
“The commander and his deputy threatened
to arrest me for saying that. He said everyone should be rearrested that he was
not releasing anybody again,” recounted Lima.
She continued: “I insisted they should give
us Sadiq for treatment, and seeing it was a gunshot injury, none of the
hospitals would accept us without a police officer attached to us. I demanded
that one of the police officers should accompany us to the hospital. They took
Sadiq to National Hospital and left. The doctors told them to wait to submit
their statement, but left. When the bandage on Sadiq's hand was removed, it was
a gunshot injury. The bullet has damaged his Radius and Ulna bone, and also damaged
the whole tendons on the wrist.”
Lima, who described the SARS officers as
cruel and inhuman, said that the family was demanding justice for Sadiq.
The Network on Police Reform in Nigeria
(NOPRIN Foundation), reacting on the matter, had written to the
Inspector-General of Police. Mohammed Adamu, demanding investigation and
justice for Sadiq and 11 other victims arrested at the same Gwarinpa venue.
The National Coordinator, Ikule Emmanuel,
who described the action of the policemen as attempted murder, further added
that the arrest and detention of 11 people arrested at their resident by men of
Special Task Force (STF) at SARs office Guzape as unlawful.
Emmanuel said: “Since the incident, the
victim has been on admission at the National Hospital with the family paying
the bills. The Police had not visited since they dropped Sadiq at the hospital.
The victim would be undergoing surgery on May 20, 2020.”
The coordinator further called on the
IGP to use his position to bring those responsible to book and ensured that the
victims are compensated for damages to their houses. NOPRIN also demanded for
full payments of the victim’s medical bills.
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