A Nigerian activist, Tunde Abass, has recounted his ordeal after he was reportedly arrested and detained for filming an incident of police brutality.
Sahara Reporters reports that Tunde was arrested on Sunday, March 21 by officers attached to Onipanu Division for filming them in operation. In a video live-streamed on his Facebook account, a policeman was seen trying to harass a young man driving a wine-colored car.
Angered by the actions of the police officers, Tunde could be heard shouting at the top of his voice and telling the police officer not to harass the man because “he has provided necessary documents”.
“You’re trying to intimidate the guy. They’ve burst his tyres. They’ve burst the guy’s tyres. They’re trying to intimidate the guy,” he said.
Speaking through his counsel, Ayo Ademiluyi, Tunde said he arrested and detained and was also denied food brought by his friends and “beaten black and blue”.
“He was also detained with a mentally deformed detainee who made his midnight sleep a miserable one by kicking him in the sides.
“He was taken to the Yaba Magistrate Court, where the police officers who brought him from Onipanu Division were not successful in filing trumped-up charges against him after same was rejected by the counsel from the Department of Public Relations, who vetted the charges” Ademiluyi said
According to the account, the police officers returned him to the cell at Onipanu Division before taking him to Legal Department of the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department, Panti “and were unsuccessful in getting a charge preferred against him”.
“In frustration, they handed him over to Divisional Police Officer of Pedro Police Station who kept him in a dark and dingy solitary cell, where nobody will have access to him,” the lawyer said
Tunde has now been released from detention. In a post shared on his Twitter handle this morning, he thanked Nigerians for standing by him during the ordeal.