Gunmen suspected to be oil thieves have reportedly killed two police corporals attached to the Owutu Police Division, Owutu, Agric, Ikorodu, Lagos State.
It was gathered that officials of the police division arrested and detained some oil thieves on Monday, mostly from the Ijaw tribe in the South-South region, but the ones that escaped during the raid regrouped and attacked the Police Station, killing two police officers in the process.
When PM news correspondent visited the Police Station on Tuesday morning, there was tension everywhere as the area was cordoned off by policemen, but all effort to speak with the Divisional Police Officer, DPO, proved abortive because newsmen were not allowed to talk to him.
Meanwhile, a source at the Police Station who spoke on condition of anonymity revealed that the incident could have been worse because of some police officer’s alleged regular connivance with the oil thieves in past years.
“I was also there this morning to gather information on what happened. I had to put a call through to somebody who confirmed the incident. However, the DPO was nowhere to be found because it seems to be a shameful and disgraceful incident,” a respected Ikorodu-based journalist said.
Reacting to the incident, the Lagos State Police Command Public Relations Officer, PPRO, Kenneth Nwosu, hinted that the oil thieves engaged the policemen in a gun fight in the midnight.
“The men, numbering about 30 engaged the police in a gun duel and two of our officers lost their lives in the process. The oil thieves sustained various degrees of injuries during the duel and they escaped. But our men are on their trail.
Investigation is ongoing as we are looking at bringing them to justice because this is really unlawful,” Nwosu said.
The force spokesman, however, refused to give the names of the officers that fell to the notorious oil thieves who operate in Ikorodu.
Meanwhile, Nigeria is the country with the highest incidents of crude oil theft in the world, the data released by Oilprice.com shows.
Recall that Chief Edwin Clark, an elder statesman who represented the Federal Government at the National Conference held in Abuja, accused the Nigerian Army in the Niger- Delta of involvement in oil theft.
