2nd April, 2014
Kazeem Ugbodaga
At least 118 suspected hoodlums have been arrested in Oshodi area of Lagos, southwest Nigeria. They were picked up early Wednesday.
Officials of the Lagos State Taskforce on Environmental and Special Offences (Enforcement) Unit, armed with guns and a Black Maria stormed Oshodi around 1.00 a.m. today and arrested the hoodlums, suspected to be involved in crminal activities in the area.
Those arrested include 106 male and 12 female. Over 160 were initially arrested but after screening at the taskforce office at Alausa, 118 of them were found wanting.
Taskforce Chairman, Bayo Sulaiman, a Chief Superintendent of Police, said the raid at Oshodi began around 1.00 am and that the exercise lasted for one hour.
He said the suspects were arrested in various dark spots in Oshodi, including under the bridge, abandoned properties, among others.
According to him, the taskforce decided to raid Oshodi after a long time due to complaints about the upsurge in petty criminal activities in the area.
“We have been receiving text messages and people calling us that they are being harrassed by hoodlums at Oshodi. We realised that we have to go after them again,” he said.
Sulaiman lamented that due to incessant raiding of hoodlums in Oshodi in the past, activities of hoodlums abated, adding as a result of a little break, they came back to the area thinking that the taskforce was no longer watching.
“We got information of where they were staying to smoke marijuana and we swooped on them and arrested them,” he added.
Sulaiman stated that the under age children among them would be taken to the Lagos State Correctional Centres for rehabilitation.
He said that the men and women among the hoodlums would be arraigned at the Special Offences Court and punished according to the laws of the state.
He disclosed that one of the suspected women hoodlums was found to be pregnant, warning that the taskforce would not fold its arm and allow hoodlums to take over Oshodi completely.
Sulaiman warned other hoodlums to stay away from Lagos as the taskforce would go after them.