Armed men rob motorists in Lagos gridlock

A motorist, Samson Olanrewaju, has narrated his ordeals in the hands of cutlass and knife-wielding robbers who attacked him and robbed him of his belongings.

Olanrewaju, in an interview on Monday said the robbers numbering up to seven robbed him and other motorists in the Ido area, along the Third Mainland Bridge on Friday around 8.30pm.

Olanrewaju, who is the Deputy Chairman of the African Action Congress in the state, said, “I was coming back from work at Lekki, so I drove down the Third Mainland Bridge towards Ido, close to Ijora Olopa where the incident happened. There was light traffic. Those guys were robbing two cars ahead of me already. I couldn’t reverse because there was traffic. I immediately wound up the glass to at least protect myself.

“But as soon as they finished with those two cars, I just heard sounds from the two sides of my car, they broke the side windscreen and began demanding my phone and other things. They entered and removed money from my safe. They had cutlasses and knives. One of them removed everything in my safe, and made away with my power bank, an iPhone 6, and a laptop.”


Olanrewaju said his ordeal was further compounded when he ran to the police station to report the incident and one of the policemen asked him to pay N3,000 for his report to be documented.

Another victim, Adetunji, who said he fell victim the same night, told our correspondent that he lost N15,000, a wallet, and his phone to the robbers.

“It was like a film. I have been hearing about these highway robbers but I never expected that I would be a victim. They took advantage of the traffic, came out of nowhere and started breaking people’s windows, they removed the side mirror of my car.

“My phone, cash and N15,000 were gone. I later got home to find out that my wallet was also not where I placed it in the car. They are small boys, some of them teenagers,” he said.

Contacted, the state Police Public Relations Officer, Benjamin Hundeyin, said the police in the area would review their strategy to improve security on the road.

The PPRO said, “We have linked him (Olanrewaju) up with the DPO and they are working hand-in-hand. He has given the DPO the necessary information that will help the DPO to review his anti-crime strategy in his domain.

“We are working on it and we believe that with the review of his strategies, such won’t happen again in that place.”

He added that the policeman that asked for N3,000 had been identified and invited to the headquarters while appropriate disciplinary action would be taken against her.