ARMSTRONG ALLAHMAGANI, Bauchi
Abdulwahab Bello, a 30 year old man, who was allegedly tortured by the Divisional Police Officer of Township Police Station (names withheld), Bauchi State Command, over allegations of stealing some chickens has narrated how his two friends were killed.
NATIONAL ACCORD had reported that Prison Inmate Development Initiative (PIDI-Nigeria), a Human Rights Group had petitioned the Bauchi State Commissioner of Police, Lawal Jimeta, accusing some Officers and men of the Command of allegedly torturing two suspected chicken thieves to death.
The petition which signed by Mbami Iliya and dated 23rd July, 2020, stated that the third suspect who was also allegedly tortured was critically ill and was receiving treatment in the hospital.
The Police Public Relations Officer of the Command, Ahmed Wakili, a Deputy Superintendent of Police, in a swift reaction, denied the allegations made against the Police by the Rights Group.
Wakile who explained that the three suspects, from information available to the Police, were mobbed when they broke into a farm and stole a number of chickens after they beat and almost killed the security guard at the farm.
However, speaking with journalists when his father and PIDI-NIGERIA brought him to the NUJ Secretariat in Bauchi on Monday in a tricycle, Abdulwahab Bello, said he miraculously survived the beating by the DPO.
He narrated that it all started when they were arrested by the Police for allegedly stealing chickens belonging to a retired Police Officer even though he was innocent of the crime he was being accused of committing.
Bello said that he met two of his deceased friends, Ibrahim Kampanlala and Ibrahim Babangida, who were looking for buyers and he suggested to them that he had a customer at the Muda Lawal Market in the metropolis.
He said that he took them to the market where they sold the chickens but unknown to him, the chickens were stolen.
According to him, shortly afterwards, he was arrested with his two friends and taken to the Township Police Station.
He said that the buyer of the chicken was brought and the matter was settled and they were asked to pay for stolen chickens.
“They asked us to pay the money for the two chickens and my father brought the N4,000 to them and the DPO told my father to go home promising that they will release me.
“We came out and he asked us to go to the back of the Police station and we did and he asked us to lie down on the ground with our stomachs, so he ordered that the first person that died, Ibrahim Kapala, should be tied.
“When the DPO asked his other Policemen to tie him and I was watching with my eyes while they tied him. When they tied him, he went into his office and brought out a piston and as soon as he got to where he was, he started hitting Ibrahim with it and broke his right leg and then broke his left leg. Some of the Police were there and none of them could say a word,” he narrated.
He added that: “While he (the DPO) was beating Kampanlala, he was saying that ‘today, stealing of chickens has ended’ and he continued beating him and he fainted. After he fainted, he started hitting him with his shoe and he was motionless.”
“The DPO said to him, ‘are you dead? It is even better that you have died’ and then he ordered that the second person be brought to him. Immediately he was brought, he descended on him also and broke his leg and then he took that piston and started hitting him with it on his chest and his back, he too fainted.”
The 30 year old survivor alleged that while his friends were being beaten, he knew the DPO would not spare him, so he had concluded that he was dead and was prepared for the worst.
“While that was happening, I just concluded that since that was happening to my friends, the same beaten and treatment would be done to me. My thought was that they would kill me too because my friend was lying down there motionless and he was telling him to die, so I just gave up and was waiting for my time.”
He denied allegations by the Police that they were serial thieves who have been terrorising residents of the area and other areas saying that “anybody that told you that I have been doing that is lying to you.”
Bello’s father, Alhaji Bello Muhktar, who spoke with journalists in an interview, accused the DPO of taking the laws into his hands saying that even if his son and his friends were guilty of the allegations being made against them, that was not a license for the DPO to torture them like he did.
He appealed to the Inspector General of Police, Mohammed Adamu, to immediately investigate the matter and ensure that the DPO who allegedly murdered the two young men and inflicted serious life-threatening injuries on his son, Abdulwahab, is brought to book.
He said: “For the Police to do this kind of thing, one day, this nation will not know peace. When a Policeman takes the laws into his hands and kills your son, tommorow, if you see him, what would you do to him? You too might take the laws into your hands. Just as he killed your son, you’ll also want to do the same to him.
“Honestly, I am appealing to the Inspector General of Police to take action on what they did to our children. My son’s offence was that he took them to the person who bought the chickens and not that he stole the chickens. For him to be beaten and his legs broken and was almost killed, imagine if he was an armed robber, what would then be done to him?”
Muhktar lamented that he had been spending so much money in his son’s treatment since the DPO allegedly dehumanized him and left him in the pool of his blood stressing that his son has never stolen any of his properties let alone going to someone’s farm to steal chickens as the Police claim.
“What I have spent so far in treating him is more than N50,000. This has not been easy with me, at all and one of his sisters has also been helpful in footing his medical bills,” he stated.
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