The Federal Capital Territory, FCT, Police Command has detained four police officers for allegedly extorting N53,000 from the Chairman of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission, ICPC, Dr Musa Aliyu, SAN, during an illegal stop-and-search operation in Abuja.
The FCT Commissioner of Police, Ahmed Sanusi, disclosed this on Monday while briefing journalists in Abuja, describing the officers as “thieves” who had no business wearing the police uniform.
According to Sanusi, the officers abandoned their designated duty posts, converged around the Banex area of Wuse, where they mounted an unauthorised checkpoint, and extorted the ICPC chairman without knowing his identity.
He said the officers compelled the ICPC chairman to withdraw N53,000 through a Point of Sale, POS, operator, made him pay the transaction charges, and later shared the money among themselves.
“I must say here too that we have about four policemen in custody as we speak who successfully extorted somebody of high importance, unknown to them that this person is a highly placed person in society. In clear terms, they extorted the Chairman of the ICPC.
“They extorted him of N53,000. They took him to a POS, he withdrew the money, paid the charges and they shared the money among themselves,” he said.
The police commissioner said investigations revealed that the officers had formed a criminal gang after leaving their various divisions to carry out the illegal operation.
“They are a gang of criminals who left various divisions, clustered together, moved to Wuse Banex and created a checkpoint where they perpetrated this act before fleeing,” he said.
Sanusi said the command subsequently declared the officers wanted and arrested their gang leader, whose confession led to the arrest of the remaining members of the syndicate.
“We got all of them. We are going to make sure they are severely punished. Those that are going to be dismissed will definitely be dismissed,” he added.
The commissioner also reiterated that the Inspector-General of Police had prohibited the indiscriminate search of citizens’ mobile phones by officers on patrol.
He advised residents not to comply with unlawful demands by police officers to search their phones on the roadside and urged them to report such incidents immediately through the police emergency lines.
“You cannot stop anybody on the road and ask the person to bring out his phone for search. If any policeman stops you and asks to search your phone, don’t agree. Call the police emergency lines and we will ask them why,” Sanusi said.
He further urged members of the public to promptly report cases of extortion and other forms of police misconduct, assuring them that officers found culpable would be tracked down and sanctioned.