Three members of the taskforce from the Enugu State Ministry of Transport deployed to monitor the Traffic light violators in the city narrowly escaped death yesterday when they were attacked and severely beaten by a police officer attached to special Anti-Robbery squared (SARS) in Enugu.
The task force personnel were trying to interdict the officer for violating the traffic light rules at the Onitsha road, Enugu when he suddenly attacked them with a stick and later pulled a gun on them before matching them off to the SARS office.
One of the victims of the attack, Mr. Nwobodo Chukwaemelie, now a second time victim, stated that he stopped Police Officer, who was in mufti, with a Toyota Saloon, No CK176 Enu, when he beat the traffic light.
Mr. Nwobodo said that to his surprise, the man alighted from the vehicle with his service pistol in one hand and a stick in another and pounced on him and inflicted injuries on his hands and legs.
He narrated that the police officer, after beating him, hand cuffed him and dragged him to the SARS office in Enugu.
Corroborating the story, the second victim, Mr. Odoabuchi Daniel,working at the same duty post said that the enraged police office extended the attack to him when he wanted to intervene and used the same stick to beat him and also inflicted injuries on him.
The third victim, Mr. Nnamani Kenneth who said the officer was acting like a possessed person described the attack as uncalled for as the officer ignored the taskforce personnel’s’ polite approach and attacked them with the sticks and his service pistol.
Commenting on the issue in an interview with Correspondents at the Government House Enugu, the state Commissioner for Transport, Mr.Chukwaka Utazi, said the activities of Police and Army were putting the operation of the taskforce monitoring traffic violators in jeopardy.
Mr. Utazi recalled that one Superintendent Okereke attached to the police state headquarters, at one time assaulted the taskforce members at the same venue while an army officer at the New Haven Junction attacked both the taskforce and the policemen on duty in another incident.
He noted that the case in which the police officer on duty at that point, was manhandled and stripped naked by the army is still being handled at the Army headquarters.
Mr. Utazi used the occasion to call on the state government to find lasting solution to the incessant attack by the Army and Police on the taskforce personnel working for the state.
He expressed wonder at the attitude of the two securities, operatives, adding that the two bodies were expected to be at the fore port of peace and order in the state.
