Kehinde Alowakennou, a master’s degree student at the University of Lagos (UNILAG), has recounted how police officers from the Festac Area E Police Station in Lagos extorted him at gunpoint on Saturday.

Alowakennou told FIJ that he was on a Bolt ride heading for a wedding ceremony at Festac when six police officers stopped the car and asked him to give himself up for a search. He said he complied with the officers, even when they asked him to unlock his phone.

“They went to my WhatsApp and checked my messages. All they saw was a transaction with a customer who wanted me to help him get a laptop for N4 million. Immediately the officer with the phone saw this, he called me a fraudster, and others joined him. They called me a picker and a loader,” he told FIJ.

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Alowakennou said the police officers threatened to arraign him on Monday if he failed to comply with them. He said he pleaded with them to read the chat from the start to where they saw the transaction, but they disagreed.

He said they drove him to their police station and took off their uniforms so he would not get their names. They then threatened to put him in a cell and seized his phone. He said one police officer asked where he lived. When he responded, the officer told him they could kill him and no one would know because he lived far away from the station.

After all the threats, Alowakennou said he stopped proving his innocence and asked the officer what they wanted. He stated that they requested N2 million, and later N1.5 million when he said he had no such money.

“An officer threatened to take me to Kirikiri. He said I would spend the rest of my life there if I failed to comply with their demands. Because I was without help, I gave them the N6,000 cash on me. Then they requested N10,000,” he said.

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“I opted to transfer to them, but they said they wanted nothing that would implicate them. Then they took me to a nearby PoS. After they collected their money, they said all they needed from me was money, but I tried to prove myself brave. They were armed.”

Alowakennou said the incident was his second experience with Festac police officers that day. According to him, some Festac officers had stopped him at Mile 2 and searched his phone. He said they found nothing incriminating on it and then apologised to him.

When FIJ contacted Benjamin Hundeyin, Lagos police spokesperson, he did not answer his calls. At press time, he had not responded to a text sent to him.