By Cletus Ukpong
A man whose car was snatched by armed robbers said some police officers whom he sought help from mockingly told him that Nigerians wanted an end to SARS, a disbanded police unit that was notorious for human rights abuses.
The incident happened last week in Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, South-south Nigeria.
The man, Cardinal Usanga, was thanking God during Sunday service in a Pentecostal church in the city, for coming out alive from the robbery incident.
He said his car, a Toyota Camry, was recovered the same day after the robbers abandoned it somewhere in the city.
“The armed robbers threatened to shoot me, they threw me out of my car. Immediately they left with my car, I flagged down a police vehicle, told them what happened and begged them to help me get my car back. The policemen said to me, ‘It’s EndSARS’. They laughed and drove away,” he said, while giving testimony in the church.
Mr Usanga said when he got to a local police station to report the robbery, some officers similarly mocked him. “You people wanted EndSARS,” one of the officers reportedly told him.
“I said to them, by faith, that my car cannot be taken away by the robbers, whether it’s endsars or not. I told them that the God I serve won’t let that happen.”
Mr Usanga said while the officer who heads the station was about sending out information to the police patrol teams on the robbery, he (the officer) was instantly told on phone that some robbers abandoned a Toyota Camry in front of a supermarket in the city.
“And it happened that that was my car,” Mr Usanga said to the congregants who were shouting and clapping.
He thanked the pastor of the church whom he said had assured him after he was robbed that the car would be recovered.
The police have handed over the car to him, he said.
After the #EndSARS protests and the violence that followed it during which dozens of people were killed including police officers, several police officers across Nigeria appeared reluctant to get back to their duty post.
Many of them have since resumed full duties