Child theft Niger Delta
kidnap spillover –Police
By Vincent Ukpong Kalu
Saturday, September
6, 2008
Lagos State Police Public Relation Officer, DSP Frank Mba
has said that the cases of child theft in Lagos is an imitation
of what obtains in the Niger Delta.
Mba said the Lagos police have lived up to the challenges
and has successfully rescued most of the victims without ransom
paid to kidnappers or physical injury sustained. On the age
brackets of missing persons, Mba said: “We categorize
missing persons according to their ages.
We have noticed an emerging trend where children in the two
to four-year bracket are mostly declared missing.
A typical scenario was the case of a two-year old boy kidnapped
recently in Satellite town and taken to Benin, Edo State.
We also discovered in most cases when children are declared
missing, there is always an internal collaboration. It is
usually somebody that knows the family too well that is implicated
during investigation. It should also be noted that the emerging
trend in Lagos is not in anywhere comparable to what is happening
in the Niger Delta.
In Lagos we discovered that most of the kidnaps are carried
out by family members or friends who have grudges against
another family member who is believed to be doing well financially.
It is a grudge that is fuelled by criminal influence.
What we have in Lagos is not kidnap in the real sense of it.
Most of the kidnappers in Lagos don’t use any offensive
weapon. What they do is to lure their victim out and pick
them. It is when they have done that that they call and demand
for ransom.
The Lagos State police command is determined to ensure that
what is happening in other parts of the nation does not thrive
here. Over 80 percent of the few case we have had in Lagos
were solved by the police and ransom was not paid. We have
rescued victims without anybody sustaining injury or paying
a dime.
The era of sending children to school unaccompanied is over.
Parents should also take into consideration the security of
their children or wards in choosing their schools, employing
domestic servants and drivers.
What parents should do
Parents must make sure they conduct proper check and search
for any domestic steward they want to engage. They should
meet the local police to investigate the background of any
domestic servant they want to employ. Having done that, they
should know that there could be sudden change in character,
people can be lured by external factors and so monitor the
domestic servants. Middle and upper class parents should teach
their children how to relate with visitors. It does not mean
that their children should be paranoid. If you leave in a
flat make sure that your children’s room is not the
first a visitor sees when he enters your house. Monitor them
when they are playing in the lawn. Don’t send them to
parks without adult being with them.
Don’t open your car door in the petrol station or in
traffic because the moment there is loss in concentration,
it is enough for someone to take a kid away. Those who operate
private schools patronized by the middle and the upper class
should install CCTV in their waiting rooms, car park and gate.
Whether it public or private school, we should formulate security
policies. Crime is evolving everywhere in the world and every
scientific stride brings bigger challenge to policing.
Street trading and crime
DSP Mba also said that hawkers and beggars in the traffic
hold up aid armed robbers by keeping arms for them as well
as act as their informers.
According to him, there was a time the police arrested three
crippled beggars who concealed guns for armed robbers in their
wheel chairs. They are also informers to robbers. Mba also
remarked the recent arrest of a woman who hawks agbo, a local
concoction and concealed four guns in the basin containing
the bottles. She would carry the agbo to any place the robbers
wanted to operate. He also said that some recharge card hawkers
at traffic hold up had in the past been arrested in possession
of arm or robbing motorists.
When government task force is raiding street traders and beggars,
people will be shouting not knowing that they aid robbery.
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