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| RAPIST IN ACTION |
Samson Folarin
Some residents of Adio, Ekimogun streets and
Kehinde Lane in the Bariga area of Lagos State have started fleeing their homes
after robbers kept attacking them repeatedly
PUNCH Metro learnt that Adio residents
were attacked three times last week, Ekimogun Street had two visits and Kehinde
Lane was invaded once.
During the raid of Ekimogun, a newly-wed woman who just moved into the house
with her husband was raped while her husband was forced to watch.
The security guard of a nursery and primary
school on Adio Street was bound by his hands and feet and beaten up severely.
The frequency of the attacks and the inability of
the police to address the scourge forced some of the residents to form local
vigilantes to ward off the robbers.
The landlady in one of the houses, who identified
herself as Olubukola, told our correspondent her children had stopped going to
school because she no longer slept at home.
She said despite not staying at home, the robbers
still broke into her room and carted away valuables.
She said, “They have entered my house three times
now. The first time was early Monday morning. They ransacked all the flats in
the building.
“On Wednesday night cum Thursday morning, they
returned and stole more things. Because of all these, people stopped living in
their houses. My children and I now squat in a friend’s apartment in Alagbado.
“But on Friday morning, we returned and
discovered the robbers had come and because they did not meet anybody, they
broke in and took away my television and DSTV decoder.”
Our correspondent learnt that in another house on
the street, the robbers carted away handsets, laptops, money and ATM cards.
A resident, who identified himself as Solomon
Johnson, said, “They demanded the PINs of the cards. After they left and
discovered that the PINs were incorrect, they returned to the room the next day
and attacked the owners for giving them wrong PINs. They then asked for the
correct PINs from them.”
It was gathered that the robbers, who were mostly
teenagers and in their early 20s, wielded cutlasses, crowbars and axes.
A resident said while some wore masks, others did
not hide their faces.
A resident, Solomon, said he was attacked with a
cutlass after the robbers thought he was hiding phones from them.
He said, “They cut my leg with a cutlass and beat
me up, telling me to release the phones. I told them I did not have any phone.
I was admitted in the hospital for two days.”
On Ekimogun where the rape took place, a resident
said the incident happened around 2am.
He said, “There is a sports viewing centre around
here and some of us stay there. If we knew a robbery was going on we could have
done something.
“But those robbers sneaked in and held those
people hostage. The woman just moved into the house with her husband. They got
married less than a month ago.
“One of the robbers raped her. She was taken to
the hospital the next day for treatment.”
A community leader and Chairman, Security
Committee for Adio Community, Femi Emiko, said the robbers always fled through
the Oworonsoki Expressway, adding that the police were not using the right
technique to arrest them.
He said, “Actually, within one week, they have
visited Adio five times. They have turned this community to an ‘ATM machine’
where they can withdraw money anytime they like.
“The police do come, but immediately the robbers
hear their siren, they run away. We have been having meetings to see how to
form vigilantes and fight these robbers. They are young guys and we can win
this fight.”
The Police Public Relations Officer, Joe Offor,
had yet to reply to a text message sent to his phone as of the time of filing
this report.
Copyright PUNCH.
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