Reports from Oyo State suggest that police brutality and harassment may have weakened in the state following the October 2020 #EndSARS protest and subsequent sittings of a judicial panel on police brutality and related matters in the state, according to several news reports on the internet and a spreadsheet of Connect Hub NG, an organisation which documents cases of police brutality in Nigeria.

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Stephen Adedigba, a lead marketer at Dufil Prima Foods in Ibadan, shares a similar belief. According to Adedigba, police brutality and extortion reduced to a noticeable degree in Ibadan and other popular places in Oyo after the October 2020 #EndSARS protest.

“From Sango to Dugbe, Iwo Road and many other places in Ibadan, I hardly hear of police high-handedness as it used to be before the protest,” he said. “Things are changing with regards to how police treat people here, I must say.”

However, a few cases of harassment have been recorded since the Oyo State Judicial Panel concluded its sittings in July. On October 9, the spokesperson for Oyo police said the command had begun an inquiry into the allegations of misconduct against some suspected officers. This was after a video showing some officers extorting money from a man trended.

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On September 22, The Guardian reported that a certain Divisional Police Officer (DPO) had harassed Don Tee, the General Manager of Jamz 100.1 FM in Ibadan.

Less than two weeks after the panel ended, police officers harassed a lady identified as Towobola and recorded her. Mohammed Adamu, the then Inspector-General of Police, ordered an investigation after a video of the harassment trended online.

Similarly, Richarmond Natha-Alade, a lawyer, demanded the sum of N1 billion for being subjected to a degrading treatment by the police in Dugbe, Ibadan.

According to The Nigeria Lawyers, an online platform for legal practitioners, the victim said he was denied entry into a police station to see his client who was in detention. When he tried to resist them, police officers beat him up and boasted that nothing would happen.

This report was produced through the ‘You Matter in this Matter’ Project being implemented by YouthHubAfrica, Onelife Initiative, Cedar Seed Foundation and FIJ, with support from Voice Nigeria.