Abayomi Shogunle, an Assistant
Commissioner of Police, has challenged those leading the #EndSARS campaign to
go to court with their claims, as well as show proof of the complaints against
officers of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad, SARS.
He said this during an interview
with Channels Television on Friday.
According to him, the reason the
#EndSars campaigners failed to take their complaints to court was simply
because they don’t have any evidence to present to the court.
“Courts are still working in
Nigeria, how many of such cases have you taken to the court for redress,” he
questioned.
“Some have done that and in some
cases, the court has awarded damages that the police should pay while the court
has thrown out some other cases, having lacked merit.
“So, if you have any issue with
the police, you can completely disregard reporting to the police and go
straight to the court.
“Why are people not going to the
courts? because they don’t have evidence or the facts they will use to pursue
their cases,” he said.
The Assistant Commissioner of
Police said there is a structure in place in the police to address criminal
cases involving SARS officials.
“There is a Commissioner of
Police, here in the Force Headquarters who is in charge of SARS operations
nationwide and the Commissioner of Police reports to the Deputy Inspector
General of Police in charge of operations and every state command has officers
in charge of SARS.
“Some of them are Assistant
Commissioners of Police, others are chief superintendents so that’s the
structure.
“Once there is any case, they are
given directives, they look into it and they carry out their investigation.”
In addition, the ACP stated that
most complaints of alleged SARS harassment come from Lagos State.
Shogunle said, “Maybe it’s
because more people in Lagos have more access to internet facilities than other
people in Nigeria or maybe because of the high commercial activities in Lagos
or maybe because most of the online media platforms are based in Lagos”.
He also said instead of going to
court, some Lawyers have become more active on the social media.
According to him, some of them
will rather complain about the issues on the social media than take concrete
action where necessary.
He said, “Unfortunately, Nigerian
lawyers are more active on social media than they should be active in courts
“You see a lawyer tweeting about
violence on social media where he can actually do a pro-bono case because part
of the things they will use in giving you a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN, is
that you must have done some cases for people free of charge, instead of
charge.”
“Instead of young lawyers going
to court to pursue a career or to improve on their profession by taking such
cases to court if you believe it is a case, they will rather prefer to come to
social media and be typing all sorts.
“The courts are there and thank
God they are working.
“The judiciary is completely
independent of the executive arm of government so the fact that people are not
going to courts, I think should be enough reason for us not to take them
seriously.”
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