Premium Times' reporters travelled across Nigeria to expose the corruption that makes a mockery of the presidential ban on interstate travel.
On April 27, President Muhammadu Buhari during his third nationwide broadcast on measures taken by the government to curb the spread of the coronavirus announced a ban on non-essential interstate travels. The president also declared a nationwide curfew from 8 p.m. to 6 a.m.
At Jibowu, touts made no attempt to hide their operations as they openly solicited for passengers and goods into several Toyota Sienna minivans parked along the main road and adjoining streets. No security personnel or state government enforcement officials were seen around. “You know El-Rufai blocking entry into Kaduna and we may be arrested or have to be quarantined for 14 days before entering,” said a worried passenger, taking a piece of furniture to Kaduna.Travellers first hint of the free-for-all extortion on the roads was the astronomical hike in fares. In some routes, passengers were charged up to 160 per cent more than the usual fare.
Almost all security outfits in the country – the police, the military, the Nigerian Vigilante Group, the Federal Road Safety Corps, the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps and even officials of states’ COVID-19 taskforces and employees of the construction company, RCC, participated in the free-for-all shakedown of mainly commercial motorists flouting the presidential order.
Close to Okada in Edo State, the driver of the minivan who had become increasingly cranky after spending a good chunk of his earned fare on bribing security personnel tried to evade a checkpoint manned by operatives of the police highway patrol units, he was pursued and intercepted at a checkpoint less than 300 metres away manned by operatives of the same team whose blockade he had tried to breach seconds ago.
The policemen later demanded a bribe of N15,000 to let the passengers and minivan go. After about 40 minutes of negotiation, they reduced it to N5,000. At this time, the bus driver had become full-blown irritable and said he was not going to pay the bribe from the fare: his passengers had to raise N5,000 among themselves to pay off the policemen.
Video and photos of a gate at the boundary between Anambra and Imo built my the Imo State government. Motorists from Owerri who were determined to get to Aba had to drive through villages where they were also extorted by villagers who placed blockages on roads. Stranded pedestrians at Nkalagu the boundary between Enugu and Ebonyi. Some pedestrian are seen walking into the bust to evade the security agents at a checkpoint ahead.
Stranded pedestrians at Nkalagu the boundary between Enugu and Ebonyi. Some pedestrian are seen walking into the bust to evade the security agents at a checkpoint ahead.Our reporter spent 48 hours on the trip from Aba to Lagos. The trip usually takes between 8 and 10 hours. This reporter arrived in Delta after 8 p.m. and had to spend the night with other travellers caught by the curfew at the old toll gate in Asaba, Delta State, on a plastic chair in the open.
But before we arrived Asaba, the driver of the minivan this reporter took from Aba made a detour through River State to avoid the checkpoints on the main road, making nonsense of Governor Nyesom Wike’s much publicised zero tolerance on entry into the state. This reporter also observed that the policemen at the station kept a register of the vehicles impounded and the bribe paid by each vehicle.
A few kilometres later, in Ibafo, we encountered another police checkpoint and the bus driver pleaded for about 15 minutes before the policemen accepted a bribe of N2,000.The extortion along the Abuja – Kaduna route started immediately the bus drove out of the park. The driver had to “settle” FRSC officers with N1,000 and another N200 to sneak through a police barricade.
“The drivers will later go beg with money and the security men will have the advantage to charge more,” the civil servant said. As predicted, after an hour of delay, the security agents started collecting N500 from each driver as they opened the barrier and allowed passage through Niger State to Kaduna.
“Turn back and go through Issah to get to the other road, in less than 20 minutes, you will be in Jere,” the cop said. Unlike the Abuja-Kaduna vehicles, the Abuja-Makurdi operators ensured no distancing as they had four passengers on the middle seat, three at the back of their space wagons. Abuja-Kaduna operators would take only two per seat, allowing some space between the passengers.
But at other points, the security agents were collecting as little as N50 to aid the violation of the travel ban. In a bizarre style, the police and soldiers on this route were using local civilians, mostly young persons, to harass drivers for a bribe. The civilian would then take the collection to the sitting officer.
Apart from Asejire, the boundary between Osun and Oyo States, where security operatives insisted on proper checks before vehicles are allowed to move either out of or into Osun State, movement from Lagos across Oyo, Kwara, Osun and part of Ondo States was seamless in the past week. Our reporter experienced this between Erin-Ile in Kwara State and Odo-Otin in Osun State, where a police officer stopped a commercial bus carrying kegs of palm oil and insisted the N100 bribe offered was not enough.
He said; “Things have improved now. Before, at Oko-Olowo checkpoint, which is a major point of entry into Ilorin, the security men used to collect between N1,000 and N5,000 depending on the size of the vehicle. You would see long lines of vehicles with rotten commodities due to prolonged waiting time on the road.
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