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A first-time visitor to Owode is likely to wonder: Is this town facing a security challenge that warrants flooding their road, the town and its environs with operatives from multiple security agencies?

Though bustling, Owode, a Lagos border town, is relatively peaceful. There’s no military garrison in the area––an airforce base at Ahanve has been there for years and it has a couple of security posts––neither is there any incident of unrest or insurgency to warrant the presence of camouflage-clad soldiers.

So, why are soldiers in town? This is no easy question for residents, traders or wayfarers. For over a year now, they have been groaning under the strain of hardship brought about by gun-toting security operatives that have gradually become pestiferous on them and the economy of their community. 

All they knew was that the influx began in late 2017, after the incident in Farasime village on October 22 wherein two young men were shot dead by a detachment of soldiers led by a police officer identified as Mohammed. In the aftermath, soldiers from Ibereko and Topo barracks had invaded the town, unleashing a rampage that left parts of the town vandalized. Since then, military operatives increased their presence and roadblocks started to proliferate until it became what it is today: a thorn in the flesh of the people.

Soldiers’ siege

On February 20, 2019, Saturday Sun toured the Owode-Apa road and observed five checkpoints manned by soldiers supposedly from the barracks of 242 Recce Battalion, Ibereko and 15 Field Engineer Regiment, Topo, Badagry.

The first detachment was stationed at Baggage, Immigration checkpoint at the very edge of the Nigeria-Benin border. From there, they strayed into the heart of the community and the nearby market. They could be seen mingling with the locals dressed in army fatigues. A few chatted with young women with unusual camaraderie. Their presence gave the commercial district an outlook of Mammy market––the typical marketplace of an army barrack.

The next set of soldiers was found at Atobaten, beside a drinking joint. They have been stationed there for about one year now. Dressed in battle fatigue, their rifles lying at their feet, the two soldiers seen were entertaining a friend who was drinking a beer. Their barrier of tyres and woods slowed traffic to a crawl, preventing drivers who might otherwise think of evading payment of the compulsory toll at the point.

A truck carrying soft drinks halted directly in their front. The driver, after he failed to sweet-talk his way through, parted with some money. The collector, a rangy youth, took the notes and stuff them in a plastic container at the feet of the soldiers who remained aloof at the exchange.

The next checkpoint was at Kweme road. At Komat Filing Station, there were five armed soldiers including a female.  There was also an army point at the bridge at Afowo, after the Airforce Forward Operation Base, Ahanve.

At Gayinbo, a combined team of soldiers and customs, parked by the roadside, carrying on a brisk business of extortion.

On the return journey, the reporter’s car ran into a traffic jam at the Undivided Church Junction where a team of soldiers was conducting a stop-and-search operation on both sides of the road. The soldiers routinely demanded: “Wetin dey your boot?” They created a bottleneck that had traffic stretched backwards for almost 400 metres.

One of the passengers was a Warrant Officer from Topo barrack. After a five-minute delay, he came down from the car in anger and had a conversation with the soldiers. The car was subsequently passed and the toll of N200 or N500 waived.

The presence of the Warrant Officer in the car facilitated easy passage through the next checkpoints: the mobile police point at Inogi Junction, a roadblock by a combined team of mobile police and soldiers at Ajanaku checkpoint and a naval checkpoint where operatives were also taking money from drivers.

Police kingdom

Previously, the Owode-Apa road had only Customs and Immigration checkpoints. This was normal for a route leading to the border. Police had capitalized on the Farasime calamity to increase their checkpoints from two to 10. Today, all shades of police departments litter the road, including those in parked vehicles marked “Police Bomb Squad” and “Police Zone 2, Ops Patrol.”

Mobile Police officers also carved out their fief on the route. They now have four points on the stretch of road. The unit at the Conoil station, a stone throw away from the soldier point in Kumart Oil and Gas Station, were particularly aggressive. With their patrol van marked “Mobile Police Joint Border Patrol, Nigeria-Benin,” the team had previously tried to supplant Customs at Baggage point on the border but, after a few months, moved a few kilometres from the town centre.

During Saturday Sun investigation, they stopped the driver of the car and bluntly demanded ‘what was due to them,’ sparking a heated conversation.

Driver: “I have not had a good day. Passenger no dey.”

Police: “How is that our business. Anytime you pass for my front here, you must pay.”

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The car was delayed for six minutes. The driver resorted to pleading.

Police: “I will not take any excuse when you are coming back.”

The driver avowed he was going to pack his car at the garage and would likely not work for the rest of the week.

Consequences

For anyone heading that way, the first hardship is the lack of vehicles at the Badagry roundabout. Previously, commuters would meet a queue of cars loading in turn at the park. Presently, passengers wait for hours on end to get even one car going that way. Only a few vehicles are willing to go to Owode––with the fare more than doubled. As they wait, commuters are swamped by Okada riders asking “You dey go?” That impresses on them that Okada is the New Order. 

One of the transporters who spoke on condition of anonymity told Saturday Sun those who ply the route are tired because the serial extortion by security operatives leaves them with nothing to take home.

“Nowadays, I do only two trips. One very early in the morning, before six, when some of the police and others are not yet there, that would lessen the amount I have to pay. My second trip is late in the evening around 10 pm. I spend the interval plying other routes in the Badagry axis. I have to change my route when I started paying about N2600 on a round trip, leaving me with less than N1000.”

Drivers who still ply the road simply transferred the extra cost to commuters, leading to an astronomical hike in fare, from N200 to as high as N500, while Okada riders charge N600 upward.

The development also affects farmers and traders who supply produce and commodities to the border town. A resident who trades in charcoal gave an insight: “If I am bringing in coals, they (security operatives) take N500, and that is because I am local. Any other person pays N1000.”

The result: inflation in the price of commodities.

Generally, the local economy took a direct hit. The Owode market used to be vibrant, patronized by communities along the border. Not any more.  Most traders, overwhelmed by the exorbitant transport fare and unending bribery at checkpoints, now find it profitable going to the market in Badagry town.

Another way the situation has drastically affected the lives of the peasant population of the town is glaring in the morning when pupils litter the road, stranded due to lack of commercial vehicles that normally conveyed them to their schools.

The locals also have to deal with the nuisance the soldiers constitute.

“Now people use them to harass others,” claimed another resident who spoke with Saturday Sun. “All our young women have become game for them.”

Ganiyu (whose middle name is Hunpe) alleged that law enforcement agents have turned the Owode-Apa road into a meal ticket. “We have four police teams from the same station mounting roadblocks within view of one another. And all they do every day is to collect money. They have worked the system into a shift,” he said. “This corrupt practice persists because this part of the country is out of sight.”

Have they made any effort to attract the attention of the relevant authority?

Yes. He gave an instance. “There was a time one of the elders in the community was brutalized by soldiers in 2018. We reported at the Local Government, and the officials there promised to do something about it.  But nothing has been done,” he said.

“We are a small community. To have such intense checkpoints around affects us psychologically,” he lamented.

Saturday Sun called the Lagos State Police Command PRO, CSP Chike Oti, to clarify the situation on the Owode-Apa Road.

“As for Lagos State Police Command, our men are not stationed on that road,” said Oti. His statement is a veiled reference to the status of the Owode-Apa stretch as a federal road.

Avowing “We cannot speak for our sister agencies,” Oti further added: “At the Lagos Command, we are careful not go against the directives from the Inspector General of Police and the Lagos State Commissioner of Police.”