Okada rider in trouble for transporting robber-passenger

An okada rider, 19-year-old Uke John, could not stop crying at the Lagos State Police Command headquarters, Ikeja on Wednesday as he narrated how he landed in police custody because of a crime he knew nothing about.

John’s case seemed to be one of being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

According to his explanation, his effort to make ends meet has landed him in the same cell with a robbery suspect, 25-year-old Olamide Oyetakin, who had stopped him to transport him away from a robbery scene.

John explained that when Oyelakin stopped him, he did not know that he had just snatched a bag and was trying to escape from the scene because he was being pursued.

“I was working around Shitta area of Surulere when Oyetakin stopped me and said I should drop him somewhere. Before I knew what was happening, people came from nowhere and took both of us. They beat us before they handed us over to the police. They said we were robbers,” he said.

Luckily for John, Oyelakin corroborated his story. The suspect said it was true that John was just an okada rider who was in the wrong place at the wrong time.

“I was on my way to rob at Shitta. I was desperate because a week before that, my shop where I repair phones had been destroyed at Ijora, Lagos . I had the intention to snatch bags at Shitta that day but I saw someone with a bag before I got there and I snatched it. But before I could escape, I was caught along with the okada rider,” he said.

Oyelakin said that was the first time he would ever rob in his life and said he was forced to take to crime because of the loss of his shop to fire.

The Lagos State Commissioner of Police, Mr. Fatai Owoseni, said the supects would be charged to court at the end of investigations.