Mixed reactions have trailed a video that went viral online, showing a man alleged to be a tout, being tortured with a pestle by operatives of the State Special Anti-Touting Squad, SASA.
In the viral video, one of the SASA operatives dressed in mufti carelessly hit the victim with a short pestle.
The SASA operative repeatedly hit him with the pestle on the suspect’s ankle and other bony parts of his body, including his chest, while his colleague videoed the victim as he was rolling on the ground, helplessly crying and begging them to allow him to explain.
There were also stains of fresh blood on different parts of the victim’s body, as a result of the beating he had received from the squad, while they continued to hit him with the wooden pestle in a place that looked like an uncompleted building.
Even while the man tried to explain to them that his wife was pregnant and that he didn’t want to die without seeing his child, the beating continued.
The SASA operatives were also overheard accusing the suspect of conniving with his brother to collect tolls at Niger Street, Onitsha, which they said were being remitted to him.
Some transport operators have come out to hail the state government over its onslaught against the touts, as according to them, the agberos are ruthless when dealing with operators and deserve such treatment.
A keke rider, who preferred anonymity, identified the suspect as Mgbilimgba, narrating how he has suffered immensely at the hands of the touts, who assault and harass them daily when they fail to pay them money.
“We commend the arrest of people like the almighty mgbiligba.
“There is hope that touting will come to an end by the time people he mentioned in the video are arrested and prosecuted.
“The government will record up to 60% success in the fight against touting. There’s hope since the untouchables are now being touched,” he noted.
Another operator, Sunday, said what the government is doing is not targeted at anybody but aimed at ridding the state of criminals who have decided that people who do their legitimate business in the transport sector would not have peace.
He said; “I have no peace for anyone who has made himself an enemy of the people by collecting money forcefully from innocent operators.
”Whatever music the government plays for them, they should be ready to dance to it. Otherwise, they should leave their illegal business which impoverishes us, the Keke operators.”
Another operator, Ifeanyi Uzo, thought that when such suspects are arrested, they should be handed over to law enforcement agents to do the needful, instead of being meted with a public trial.
He however expressed concerns over the complicity of the law enforcement agents in the touting business, recalling how suspects had been released no sooner than they were arrested, to come back and continue the assault on operators.
On his part, the Coordinator, of Anambra Keke Drivers Forum, AKDF, Comrade Osita Obi, observed that the SASA is a noble concept by Governor Chukwuma Soludo, but the way the leaders are operating it makes it no different from the way touts operate.
“Some operators have had encounters with the SASA and their mode of operation shows no distinction from the regular operation of the touts.
”It goes to say that the leaders of the SASA are touts and there is no way the state can effectively fight touting if touts are in charge of curbing the menace.
”SASA no doubt, is commendable as it became an urgent step to address the menace of touts in the state, but the way they are going about it, the government needs to look into it,” he said.
However, the Director of SASA, Chukwuebuka Solomon, when contacted, said no form of blackmail can stop them from achieving their mandate of ridding the state of touts and touting activities.
He revealed that the blackmail is coming because the rich people behind the touting business are the ones fighting back.
“They have been offering us all kinds of bribes to derail the mandate and when we refuse, they are now coming up with this blackmail.
“We are committed to this task assigned to us by the governor and we must accomplish it.
“It has never been said that anyone was in his house or his legitimate business and the SASA arrested them.
“It is our joy that the true lovers of the state are applauding what we are doing and we are comfortable with that.
“Go to the hitherto dreaded Upper Iweka and see the sanity we have restored to the place. But those we put out of their negative business want the state to go back to the dark days of touting.
”We cannot be cowed,” he vowed.
