Wednesday, 29 January 2025 11:40

[OPINION] Okoya Sons: Why Police Escort Has My Sympathy - Comfort Obi

I have sympathy for him, even without knowing his fate. I don’t even know whether he is still in detention or not. I mean the unfortunate Policeman who escorted the two sons of Billionaire Rasaq and  beautiful  wife, Shade, to a club or wherever.

I may have missed it, but I also have not come across his name, or rank.

Nothing much has been heard of him since Force Spokesperson,  Olumuyiwa Adejobi, told us of  his arrest and deserved detention for engaging in conduct unbecoming of a Policeman.

So, you ask, if I agree that his behavior was unbecoming of a Policeman, why does he still have my sympathy? Why does my heart go out to him? Why do I think he is a scape goat? I mean, a good number of his colleagues are that subservient before big men/women to whom they are assigned. While on my beat one day, I stumbled on a Police Inspector who always jogged to answer his “oga” each time he called him. He never walked. Then, he would go on all fours on all fours before his “oga”. And he never looked up. He didn’t have the courage to. An Inspector for God’s sake! A look at him told me he had become a nervous wreck.

I was so scandalized I engineered his reposting as soon as I got back to Abuja.

For the records, let me, also, point out that nothing much has been heard of the Okoya sons since their escapades went viral on Social Media.

You, of course, know this story.

But for the purpose of this write-up, excuse a brief recap.

According to reports, the Policeman escorted the two Okoya sons to a fun spot or whatever. I don’t know if the young men were entitled to Police escort or not. But even if they were, he was not treated as one. In his full uniform, he was reduced to a servant. There was no respect for his uniform. In public, and being videod, he  carried, for the Okaya sons, stacks of Naira notes. In 1,000 denominations, clean, crisp, as if they came straight from the Central Bank of Nigeria. The type of clean notes I hate to spend if, and when somebody “dashes me”. It is never available in banks.

It is okay for you to laugh at me, but, I once had a bundle of N500,000 with me – new, crisp, and I still borrowed money from my girl to buy bread for the house. It has to be an emergency for me to spend new notes. But these two young men had them in bundles. They ran into a few millions. It didn’t bother them. It was nothing to them. So, why bother to carry them and/or hold them by themselves? Or hide them like me. To them, “money na paper”.  They simply gave the bundles to the Policeman to carry for them.

So, this Policeman, in full uniform, stood there, like Fela’s zombie, carrying the bundles of money. As he stood, the Okoya boys danced as if there will be no tomorrow. As they danced, they were taking the money from him, and spraying it as if money was going out of circulation.

Please, remind me, for I may have forgotten. But, was this not the same offence Bobrisky committed, and with lesser amount of money than the Okoyas, for which she went to jail?; for which she has proceeded on self-exile? But I digress.

I was talking about the Policeman.

I don’t know whether he felt awkward, you know,  ashamed of the situation he found himself in. Perhaps. Because, in the video which made the rounds, he pulled his cap, a fez cap, so down it covered half of his face.

The video attracted two official reactions – one from the Nigerian Police Headquarters, the other from the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC.

In a statement, the EFCC informed us that the Okoya boys have been invited to their Lagos Office over their alleged abuse of the Naira. Meaning is that, on arrival, they would be interrogated, asked questions like: “Did you or did you not?”

Initially, according to reports, one of the Okoya boys reacted by saying something like: the “hoopla” is because  they are children of the rich! I found that rude. But well, he is a kid. Youthful exuberance, let me not say spoilt brat.

However, he kind of swallowed his vomit when the EFCC invited him and his brother, and when the Police reacted. He quickly apologized to  Nigerians and the Police Force and the EFCC. He pleaded ignorance of the implications of what he did. But was that not exactly the same ignorance Bobrisky pleaded? That didn’t save him.

I was looking forward to the appearance of the Okoya brothers before the EFCC. Not for anything else, but the satisfaction that they could be called to order, the status of their parents notwithstanding. Perhaps, I missed it. And since then, I have not heard any “pim” again on the case.

The second reaction was from the Police Force Headquarters. Its Spokesperson, Olumuyiwa Adejobi, said the Police Officer in the video has been identified. The statement condemned, strongly, the behavior of the Officer. It said he behaved disgracefully. Correct. That he disrespected his uniform. Correct. That as a law officer, he should have corrected the boys? Mmmm? That he was not assigned to the Okoya sons; that he was, instead, sent on guard duties at Eleganza – a company owned by the Okoyas, the boys’ parents; and so, he had no business following the brothers out, not to talk of acting as their servant, their “money carrier”, mobile bank. True?

But let me begin by saying that what the Police Officer did was shameful. Disgraceful. Condemnable. An insult to his uniform and the Police Force. Meaning that I agree with Police Force Spokesperson, Adejobi. Now, I need to ask a couple of questions here.

What choice did the Policeman have? Who would have backed him up if he had refused to follow the brothers out?

Who would have backed him if he had refused to play the disgraceful and disgusting role assigned to him by the boys? Who would have backed him up if he had refused to carry the money for them? What if the boys report him to their parents for refusing to carry out their orders? What if one of them had slapped him in public? Yes, slap. It happens.

A number of big men and women reduce  Police escorts attached to them to rags, almost. They reduce them to their domestic servants, bag carriers, shoe cleaners, and gate men.They speak to them carelessly and call them derogatory names. And worse.

Such Police escorts swallow all that because they have no choice. They have lost self esteem.

They hardly report what they go through to their bosses because they are afraid of the relationship their Principals have with their Police bosses. If they report, who will believe them? Who will speak for them? What if they are punished instead? It happens.

I was on the Board of the Police Service Commission, PSC, for 10 years, and I can testify that most times, Police  hardly defend their own. Atimes, even their senior officers are not spared. It is not unusual for them to be sacrificed on the altar of sycophancy.

On, at least, four occasions the Police Service Commission, under the Chairmanship of Parry Osayande, DIG, retd, one of the best officers the NPF ever produced, intervened to save the jobs of Senior Officers when their bosses had recommended severe disciplinary actions, or even retirement to the PSC.

One State Commissioner of Police was recommended for severe disciplinary  action because he  did not accompany the State Governor to an official visit to one Community. It was a scandalized  Osayande who threw the recommendation out and explained: “Who told them a State a Commissioner accompanies a Governor to such tours? The Commissioner accompanies the President. It is the Assistant Commissioner, Operations, who should accompany the Governor.” Drawing from that,

Osayande  attributed the disrespect for State Commissioners by some Governors to such issues. For instance, he wondered why a State Governor, as happens often, would keep a Commissioner of Police waiting for hours just to see him. “CPs are busy”, he always said. “When you ask them to see you, don’t keep them waiting. They are not politicians.”

On another occasion, another State Commissioner of Police was recommended for retirement. His offence? An alleged break of protocol during President Goodluck Jonathan’s visit to his State. He did not. He was innocent. His superior was guilty. But the CP was recommended for retirement just to save the job of his  superior. When somebody drew the attention of President Jonathan to it, he backed the PSC, and saved the Commissioner’s job. And there are worse instances, particularly when they concern middle level officers, Inspectors and other ranks.

But back to the Okoya brothers’ Police escort. My instinct, given the way he stood there like a sacrificial lamb, is that he was ashamed of the role the brothers assigned to him to play,  but he had no choice. He was helpless. And he was intimidated by the rich, the environment he found himself in and the “sheer largeness” of the amount of money he was carrying. He may not have seen such an amount of money before. And it was just to be frittered away when, perhaps, he didn’t have N100,000 to his name.

What to do?

Policemen like him need re-orientation. They need their self esteem back. They need to know that when they are in their uniform, they are the Federal Government. They are serving their fatherland, and their job is respectable and dignified. Without their presence, especially, along the road, and especially now, not a few people will be afraid to be on the road – forget they are bad-mouthed because a few bad eggs amongst them have given the Police a bad name. But which profession is free of bad eggs? Tell me.

Policemen are human beings, and live in the same environment as us. They are afflicted by the same disease, that afflicts us. Don’t you see that since Nigeria exposed soldiers to Police duties, some of them have been afflicted by same disease.

So here’s my unsolicited advice: Draw the ears of the Okoya brothers’ Police escort. Help him regain his self esteem. And send him back to his job – please,  not to the Okoyas – with a warning.

Nothing more, nothing less.

 



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