Soludo’s Anti Touts agents beat us with planks every morning – Arrested keke drivers lament

By Maduako Igbokwe

Members of Tricycle Drivers in Awka, Anambra State, who were detained by Governor Charles Soludo’s Anti Touts squad said they were beaten with 2×2 planks without foods for two days in detention.

Some of the victims who spoke with our reporter in Awka at their Christmas end of year party said that the two days they were detained at the Anambra State Anti Touts squad facility in Onitsha was like hell.

According to them, the early morning beating was christened morning tea.

The vice chairman of Keke Drivers Association, Unizik park who was arrested along others said: “When we got at Anti Touts squad facility Onitsha, we slept inside their bus, and in the morning they used 2×2 planks to beat us, hitting our legs and joints with the planks.

“They said it was morning tea for us. After beating us with 2×2, they made us lie us down under the sun and continue with the beatings. It was when their ‘oga’ came out and ordered them to stop the beatings that they stopped beating us.

“Before me and others, they were telling some of the arrested Agboro that they will cloth them with Id card and they will move them to work at their respective places. They told them that nobody will disturb or arrest them again in their pit but they should be making returns.

“They gave them their phone numbers to call them incase anyone came to disturbed them. Most of the Anti Touts members are recruited from the touts for them. There is serious problem because touts cannot fight touts,” he said.

Another Keke drivers, Chibueze Nweke said that they stayed two days without food in Anti Touts squad facility in Onitsha.

According to him, though they did not beat him much, but there were some people they broke their legs with 2×2.

He said that if the Anti Touts people are not properly monitored they will destroy many people in Anambra State.

Also the chairman of Keke drivers Unizik pit , Comrade JohnPaul Nnaegbuna said the Anti Touts has no business coming to their pit because the park is privately owned and the State government approved of it and it allowed park owner to collect fee from drivers.

“When these men came inside the park some people were wearing Unified Hybrid Enforcement Team (UHBET)
uniforms while others were wearing state Anti Touts squad SASA. I asked them who are you, they replied that they came to catch Agboro. I told them that there are no Agboro at our Park. I told them that everybody here is a Keke driver.
I told them also that all the people in the park are Keke drivers and we know ourselves one by one.

“It was on the process of discussion, I had wanted to call one of our members, Mr Iwunor to come in and beg them, that one of them just pounced on me with with knife and cut my finger. He said I was making calls as if making calls has become a crime.

“It was then that Keke drivers said no, you cannot come into our park and start beating our Chairman and others without any justification and they started protecting themselves.

“Then, they began to shoot and called for reinforcement and they came dealt with every body in the park mercilessly,” he said .

He lamented that the quad beat them and vandalised their vehicles right inside the park, without a just cause, and wondered what could be their fate outside the park.

He stated that the detention facility was an unapproved facility, but an improvised hidden camp meant for torturing.

He appealed to the state government to intervene and repair those vehicles as it is the only means where these drivers eat and pay their monthly taxes.

The activities of touts had recently become a worry to the Soludo government, leading to the establishment of anti tout unit by the state governor.

There is however concerns that those trying to curb touting in the state were far more dangerous than the touts they seek to exterminate.