A yet-to-be-identified number of people were shot dead on Wednesday evening as armed robbers invaded Apomu and Ikire towns in Osun State.
For the hours they raided, the armed robbers vandalized the First Bank branch in Ikire and that of Access Bank in Apomu, which are a few kilometres apart.
Speaking with FIJ, Abeeb Ridwan, a resident of Apomu, explained that the armed robbers had first attacked the Ikire Divisional Police headquarters before proceeding to rob the banks.
“They first attacked the police station in Ikire before invading the two banks at Ikire and Apomu,” he said.
“A couple of police officers were killed in Ikire and several other residents of Apomu, including my cousin, were hit by stray bullets.”
According to Premium Times, however, four policemen died during the attack in Ikire.
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Residents told FIJ that there was no functional police station in Apomu but the armed robbers were partly resisted by members of Oodua Peoples Congress (OPC).
Although Yemisi Opalola, the Osun Police spokesman, had not replied to FIJ’s text message on the incident as of press time, she told Premium Times earlier on Thursday that “the robbers did not succeed in robbing any of the banks as they fled to the bush with gunshot wounds, abandoning two of the operational vehicles they came with”.
In previous bank robberies, the established the pattern was about attacking nearby police stations before taking charge of the targeted commercial banks. Common examples are the bank robberies in Offa, Kwara State, and Ile Oluji, Ondo State, in April 2018 and February 2020 respectively.
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