Who Shot Segun Alade?

Who shot at Segun Alade’s vehicle and made it to somersault into the bush on Ogbese –Akure Road (Ondo State) around 7pm on July 14, 2013. Alade, who is clinging to life at the Akure Specialist Hospital, alleges it was a team of policemen in a Hilux vehicle. The police insist Alade was involved in a lone accident. But who shot him? 

If Segun Alade had any inkling of the danger lurking somewhere along the Owo-Akure road on July 14, 2013, he would have postponed his journey. 

But sadly, he does not have the gift of clairvoyance. Alade, a forest guard with the Ondo State Ministry of Natural Resources, was travelling from Ogbese to Akure. 

He had a smooth drive up to Bolorunduro. Suddenly, he saw an unmarked Hilux vehicle trailing his car, while it occupants were shouting at him to stop. 

Thinking the occupants of the vehicle might be armed robbers, he increased the speed of his car to escape attack. But his pursuers fired gunshots at his car.

A bullet hit one of the tyres, causing the car to summersault and throw Alade into the bush. It was when the occupants of the Hilux vehicle approached the scene of the accident that the victim realised his pursuers were policemen.

Instead of rescuing him, the policemen thought he was dead and took to their heels, leaving their victim to lie in a pool of blood for about four hours. However, providence intervened in an ironical manner.

Another team of policemen on patrol discovered Alade inside the bush and took him to the Emergency Unit of Akure Specialist Hospital. Groaning intermittently, Alade recalled the incident: “I was travelling from Ogbese to Akure.

On getting to Bolorunduro, I suddenly saw an unmarked Hilux vehicle driving out from a bush path. I can’t say if it was blue or black. It was around 7pm.

The occupants of the van asked me to stop. I thought they were armed robbers and I ran for my life. They started to pursue me with the van’s full lights on.

At a point, they started shooting at my car. “While they were pursuing me, I discovered that the vehicle was one of those Ondo state government donated to the police. I was about to stop, but they were shooting seriously at my car. A bullet hit one of my tyres. The car somersaulted three times, throwing me into the bush.

I was on high speed and the only one in the car. It was when those who were pursuing me came to the scene of the accident that I knew that they were policemen.

“I pretended as if I was dead. When they approached the scene of the accident, instead of rescuing me, they ran away, thinking that I was dead. I was surprised that policemen could do this to me. Written on the panel of the vehicle was “Fast Strike Squad”.

One of them said “e be like say this one don die o. Let us waka o”. They did not make any effort to rescue me. That was how they left.”

He added: “I was there for about four hours and it was raining. I discovered that I could no longer raise my hands and legs. I was there struggling. Around 11pm, I saw another police patrol team that came in a white van.

They saw my vehicle and waited. Their boss said “e be like say dis one na fresh accident”. He asked them to comb the bush if there was somebody there. The officers did not check very well and reported to their boss that there was nobody in the bush.

He asked them if they were sure and they answered in the affirmative. “As they were leaving, the boss said they should go back and search the bush again.

He came down. I was tired. I could not shout. They put on their torch lights and they saw me where I was writhing in pain. They pitied me and carried me to their vehicle. I was covered with blood. They were the ones who took me to the Emergency Unit of the Akure Specialist Hospital.

“My phone had broken. But one of the policemen removed my SIM card and inserted it in his phone. He checked out for my contacts and asked me who he could contact.

I told them Tunde Alade. He called him, Wale, my friend and my wife. They came to the hospital. Before my people came, they asked me if I had money. I asked them to check my pocket and they saw N6, 000 plus. They started treatment with the money before my people came.”

Alade said further: “I am only interested in my recovery. I have been in pains since the accident occurred. I am not okay at all. If government should help, that would be okay. “I had been moving my legs and hands freely, but I can’t move them now. I can’t eat until they feed me. I am a civil servant.

I am not an armed robber. I don’t have any criminal record. You can check. I have been working for government for over 17 years now. I am serving in Akure presently with the Ministry of Natural Resources. I don’t know what I did to deserve this.”

Alade’s lawyer, Grace Obanigba, has petitioned the State Commissioner of Police, demanding “the immediate investigation, interrogation and prosecution of the perpetrators of this barbaric act who are officers of the police command operating illegally with unmarked black patrol van.”

The lawyer also demanded that the hospital bill of the victim should be refunded to him and the cost of repairs of his damaged car be calculated and refunded.

Obanigba added: “In the event of your failure and/or delay in so doing, our client will have no other option than to seek legal redress in a court of competent jurisdiction. Your command should publish a public apology in at least two national dailies in favour of our client.”

The legal practitioner frowned at the reported claim of the State Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO), Wole Ogodo, that Alade was involved in a lone accident.

“It is surprising and worrisome that the Ondo State police command, through the police public relations officer (PPRO), ASP. Wole Ogodo, misrepresented the true position of the matter wherein he stated categorically that the report from Oba-Ile Divisional police station showed that the victim (our client) was involved in a lone accident.

He further stated that he was rescued from the scene four hours after the accident. Are we then to say that those bullets removed from his body and those that hit his car were shot by spirit beings?

We therefore submit that both police team conspired together to input the story. How did the police team that rescued him have the information that it was an accident because the accident occurred in the dead of the night?

“It is our position that this is a calculated attempt by the police whose main duty is to protect the citizen, but fail to do so, to give an uncharitable excuse.

This is a clear case of dereliction of duty. Instead, they covered up the illegal, barbaric and inhuman acts unleashed on our client and to exonerate themselves thereby denying our client the justice of this case,” she wrote in the petition.

When Saturday Mirror contacted Ogodo on phone, he said he was aware of the petition written by the victim, saying the command would look into it