THE UNDERGRADUATE ROBBERS
August 20 2001
extracted from all africa.com
Nigerian higher institutions once noted for churning out future leaders are now breeding ground for armed robbers.
The day was Tuesday, 7 August 2001. The place was a storey building inside the expansive compound of Ogun State Police Command, Eleweran in the outskirts of Abeokuta, the state capital. Outside the building sat three anti-robbery squad police officers discussing their exploits in arresting men of the underworld. Suddenly, their discussion came to an abrupt end. A bulky, stern looking police officer in mufti, led a group of four out of the building clutching a rifle, he commanded, "sit down here you crooks" The four unfettered and holding each others shirts obeyed. They stopped behind the walls of the building.
Waiting for this reporter and others for an interview on what led them to the dingy cells of Eleweran.
Segun Ogunsanya, Sociology, 4OO Level; Kazeem Azeez, Business Administration, 200 Level; Wale Ogunbade, Geology, 200 Level; and Feyisayo Rapheal a new intake, are all students of the Ogun State University, Ago-Iwoye now Olabisi Onabanjo University. They were arrested about three weeks ago on suspicion of armed robbery.
After parading the four before TheNEWS to see, all, except Ogunsanya, the alleged gang leader, was left alone to face a barrage of questions concerning their exploits in the robbery world. The 21-year-old Ogunsanya from Remo in Ogun State began his story by saying that his other three friends knew nothing for what they had been held for. According to him, he implicated them when the vigilante in Ijebu-Ode forced him to do so. "They (vigilante), beat me thoroughly, that is why I mentioned all this people who are my friends" Ogunsanya in dirty yellow shirts and brown nicker told this magazine.
But the Ogun State Commissioner of Police, Prince Udom U. Ekpoudom counters Ogunsanya's defence. "We arrested them because they are armed robbers, and they have confessed to having robbed many times in Ijebu-Ode. They confessed and we recovered arms and ammunition from them" Ekpoudom told TheNEWS.
For Ogunsanya and his gang, Tuesday, July 24, was a bad day. Ogunsanya and members of his gang had gone to rob a prominent medical doctor and a transporter in Ijebu-Ode, Ogun State. The operation was successful as they went away with their loots. But they made a costly mistake. A shirt, which happens to be the uniform of the vigilante in Ijebu-Ode of which Ogunsanya is a member was left at the scene of the robbery. That singular error gave the vigilante the clue that led to the arrest of Ogunsanya. The vigilante then handed him over to the police. Ogunsanya, now in the police net denied that the shirt that was said to be his, was his own. But later, like fish out of water, he opened up that the shirt was actually his and that he belong to a gang of armed robbers.
Indeed, Ogunsanya and his gang, the police believe are responsible for many robbery incidents it has been working on for some time. The police said Segun and his terror gang went to rob at permanent site of the university in the in the month of February.
Not only that, Ogunsanya told this magazine that he was involved in a bank robbery at Ikukare, Ogere.
In fact, it was learnt that Segun belong to two gangs. One of the gang is made up of four students from the state university, and another gang is made up of men from Lagos. Segun and his gang are not the only students robbers cooling off in the state police cells.
Last months, the state police command nabbed two students of the Ibadan Polytechnic who were negotiating to sell a stolen jeep. The two undergraduates had robbed the owner of the jeep at gun point. Similarly, another group of undergraduate students were also arrested by the state police command. They were caught in a car full of arms and ammunition. This arrest has brought to 12, the total number of student robbers now in police net in the state.
The disease of undergraduate robbers is not limited to Olabisi Onabanjo University alone. It is also a problem in some other higher institutions in the country. From Benue State University to Enugu State University of Science and Technology down to Imo State University and the Lagos State University (LASU), undergraduate robbers are swelling by day. Early this month, the Benue State Police Command paraded six armed robbery suspects. Out of this, two were university undergraduate.
The two-Mark Teschemba, a final year diploma student of the University of Jos, Makurdi outreach campus and Awuhe Terhemba, a Business Management student of Benue State University were arrested by the state police command for conniving with the son of a pastor, master Johnson Ariwa to snatch a peogeot 504 car. Dagba Teskimbi, one of the suspected car robber, was mowed down in a shoot-out encounter with the police. Speaking to newsmen during the parade, with their heads bowed, the two alleged undergraduate robbers confessed that they were indeed criminals. "We had hoped to get some quick money but it backfired", they admitted.
Attempt by two final year students of the Enugu State University of Science and Technology (ESUT), to make quick money like their counterparts arrested in Benue State also backfired.
The final year insurance students, his bus conductor brother from Okigwe, Imo State and a final year law student were nabbed along Okpara Avenue, Enugu by the Enugu State police while coming from a robbery operation. The student robbers were not arrested easily. They engaged the police in a shoot-out encounter. At the end of the battle one of them escaped from the law, while the others were arrested. At the time of the arrest, the police found locally made pistol and one live ammunition with them.
In Abakaliki, the Ebonyi State Capital, in that same month, seven armed robbery suspects including two female undergraduates were arrested by the state police command. Mr. John Ahmodu, the state police commissioner, told news men that the suspects were arrested after a tip off. According to him, the suspects were alleged to have robbed a business woman of N130,000. The police found a pistol, four live ammunition and N46,000 being part of the stolen items on them.
The robbers according to the police boss, had already bought rugs and other household items with the money. The rugs were on display for newsmen to see that day. Similarly, last year September, three final year students of the Lagos State University, Ojo, Lagos were arrested by the police for alleged armed robbery.
The students, Messrs. Kumuyi Olufemi Adeyemi, Georgraphy and Regional Planning, Akinyemi Rilwan Oladimeji, Chemical Engineering and Emmanuel Isidahamen were arrested by the state police command.
Adeyemi, who claims to be a son of a retired Director of Consult of Yaba College of Technology was arrested on Friday, August 25 at about 10:00pm at a black spot in Satellite Town, with a Lisa pistol- NP 25, with seven rounds of live ammunition and some charms. The police said he was on his way to rob some houses.
After his arrest and after being subjected to severe interrogation, Adeyemi was said to have told the police that he was not alone in the robbery business. He mentioned three other members of his gang. Acting on this revelation, the police detectives swung into action and arrested the duo of Oladimeji and Isidahamen at their various hide out. Speaking while on parade before newsmen on Wednesday, 13 September 2000, Adeyemi admitted that though, he was actually arrested with a gun, live ammunition and charms, he was never an armed robber. "I am an axe-man but I am not a hit man" he insisted. His two other colleagues also claimed to be cultists, not robbers.
The Lagos Airport police command, almost a month after the LASU students saga, also arrested seven armed robbery suspects including a graduate of the Ahmadu Bello University (ABU), Zaria. The deputy commissioner of police (DCP), at the command, Mr. Tsoho Useni said the suspects were part of the nine-member gang using commercial vehicles, particularly mini buses, to rob commuters at various busy routes in the Lagos metropolis.
The gang led by 20-year-old Kodjo were arrested during operation on July 24.
The gang, before being nabbed on July 24 at NAHCO junction, along the Airport Road by policemen on patrol, had carried out over four successful operations along Apapa-Wharf Road, Mile Two - Orile Road and International Airport-Oshodi road. At the time of their arrest, the police found N163,000, two mini buses with Lagos registration number, XC696 AGL and VC 468 MUS and various household electronics valued at several thousands of naira.
Barely a month after the Lagos police command arrested an ABU undergraduate along with six others, the Imo State Police command also caught seven students robbers of the State University for armed banditry. This magazine learnt that the suspects were arrested along with a vehicle owner and driver who specialises in supplying the robbers with vehicles in the state. A number of exhibits ranging from masks, berets, locally made pistols, automatic revolvers, machetes and black jackets suspected to have been used in various successful operations in the state capital and its environs were also recovered by the police. It was gathered that the seven undergraduates hoodlums were nabbed near the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA), premises in the city while they were about to operate at 8:00pm on Monday, 2 October 2000.
But students abandoning studies for crime is not a university or polytechnic affair alone, students of colleges of education are also not left out. Last December, the police in Nazarawa State arrested a student of the state college of education Akwanga, alongside eight suspected terror gang. The undergraduate robber who said the robbery operation was his first outing, also told the police that he was given a meagre sum of N600 as his own share in the operation. He explained that he got involved himself in robbery because he was asked to resit his papers after an examination. The student, according to the police, was a member of a notorious armed robbery gang terrorising innocent residents of Akwanga town.
With the rising wave of student undergraduates robbers, the question on many lips is why guns are now more important than pen and books nowadays? Prince Ekpoudom provides answers. He said broken homes is a number one factor. "When a man decide to marry so many wives and the children are not being taken care of by fathers or mothers, they become vagabonds without any control" said the police boss. He also said that the get rich quick syndrome is another factor. "Students these days want to jump from one to hundreds" Ekpoudom said. Using the child development analogy, the police boss said a child cannot be delivered today and he starts walking, he must sit down, crawl before he starts walking.
What then can be done to address this ugly development? Ekpoudom said the salvation lies in teaching our children the fear of God right from the primary school level. To achieve this, he welcome the idea of some state governments who have handed mission schools back to religious bodies. "From the beginning, they will teach you religious ethics in the school" he reasoned.
