Lagos police officers in mufti not on patrol – Official

The police in Lagos State have said their officers pictured without the ‘approved uniform’ were not on patrol.

Benjamin Hundeyin, the spokesperson of the police in the state, on Monday, explained that the officer and his team are members of the “tactical units recently reorganized by @LagosPoliceNG CP Idowu Owohunwa to tackle cultism headlong in Lagos State.”

He made the revelation via his Twitter handle following a report made by a road user in the state.

Ayo-Bankole Akintujoye had tweeted about seeing some officers dressed like the now-disbanded Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) on the Lekki-Epe expressway in Lagos.

Responding to the tweet, the Nigeria Police Force spokesperson, Muyiwa Adejobi, said officers on patrol are not allowed to wear any clothes aside from the approved uniform.

‘Tactical Unit’

However, Mr Hundeyin, who shed more light on the matter, explained that the officers were on a time-sensitive assignment and had to alight to ease the traffic flow.

“His team alongside others were behind the recent arrest of forty-two suspected cultists in a space of two weeks in different parts of the state,” he wrote.

“On this day, they were going for an assignment and ran into a heavy gridlock. Due to how time-sensitive the assignment was, they disembarked to clear the traffic. While a few of them were directing cars to ease the gridlock, others like the one pictured were ‘on guard.’

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“It is important to point out that they all had police identity on them. The jackets had POLICE boldly written behind them. Others had helmets with POLICE boldly inscribed on them. They took adequate care to ensure that.

“You would also agree that many road users applauded them for a job well done. At no point did they engage in stop-and-search, neither were they on routine township patrol.”

The spokesperson commended the road user for reporting the matter.

“Nonetheless, we truly commend you for seeing something and saying something. And we do not rule out the possibility of some police officers in some places appearing this way for stop-and-search and routine patrol (in dissonance with extant regulations),” he said.