BARELY five days after robbers attacked a luxury bus conveying students to Lagos, along the Ijebu-Ode /Benin expressway, carting away money and valuables which monetary could not be ascertained, a similar attack occurred yesterday on same route.
This time around, however, one of the robbery suspects was arrested after a reported fifteen minutes gun battle with policemen. The others managed to escape. Reports said the gun men, as usual, barricaded the expressway, where they dispossessed unsuspecting motorists of cash, GSM handsets and other valuables.
State police command spokesman, Mr Olumuyiwa Adejobi, told Vanguard:
“The command, around 5.30am today (yesterday) at J3 area of the state arrested one Sunday Akpan of Imopa, Ijebu Ode while he and his colleagues blocked the expressway and dispossessed road users of their valuables.”
The Divisional Police Officer of Ogbere, Superintendent of Police Mohammed Ajose, who was on the Anti-Express Robbery Patrol, led a team of policemen to the scene and engaged the armed men.
They cleared the robbers’ obstruction made with logs of wood and escorted the road users out of the scene.
The suspect was arrested after a gun battle while others fled with bullet wounds.
It will be recalled that barely 24 hours the Ogun State Police Command vowed to get rid of the hoodlums terrorizing innocent Nigerians plying the ever busy Lagos/Ijebu/ Benin Expressway particularly those who attacked the students in a luxury bus on their way to Lagos from Enugu at Ogbere area of Ogun State.
Adejobi said the command had placed a manhunt on the fleeing robbers, adding that during interrogation the suspect confessed to belonging to one of the syndicates that terrorize people along the expressway.
Exhibits recovered from the suspect, according to Adejobi, included assorted handsets stolen from the victims and an unregistered Bajaj motorcycle.
In another development, Adejobi said the Commissioner of Police Anti crime patrol in Ibafo area of the state yesterday dislodged some vandals along the Arepo waterways.
He said that during the raid “the vandals abandoned the vandalized products and ran into the water, with a total of 700 twenty-five litre jerry cans filled with petroleum products recovered in six boats.”
Officials of the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation from Sagamu Depot he said, had been contacted for necessary action and thereby reiterate the command’s commitment to provide adequate security for all, even as he appealed to members of the public to assist the police with useful information..
