Staff ReporterTwo persons were set ablaze yesterday when a suspected ritual kidnappers’ underground den was found in Ijaiye, Lagos State.
Three persons were arrested.
The den is inside a canal at Obadeyi/Ajala in Ijaiye on the Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway.
The ritualists ran into troubl when a highway sweeper with the Lagos State Waste Management Agency (LAWMA) heard a woman calling for help from the canal.
Two of the suspects caught inside the den were set ablaze by a mob; the others were taken to the Alakuko Police Station.
They confessed that the den has been in operation for over four years.
Some soldiers attached to the OPMESA, on a routine patrol of the area, rescued two victims.
‘’One of the suspects had boasted that there was nothing they could do to kill him. They were however stoned to death and subsequently set ablaze,’’ an eyewitness said.
The incident created heavy traffic on the express as residents flocked out the scene.
One of the recused suspects was said to have confessed that there are over 20 victims inside the canal.
An eyewitness said: ‘’At about 8am, a LAWMA sweeper heard the cry of a woman from the underground canal which connected Obadeyi bus stop to Ajala/ Ijaiye, and she alerted bystanders to the scene.
“The soldiers and policemen searched parts of the underground den and after about four hours later, two persons found unconscious were rescued and taken to a hospital.’’
It was gathered that the crowd later succeeded and set ablaze one of the suspects, but surprisingly to them, as fire was burning all over him, he appeared unhurt.
Another eyewitness Adewole Adewale said: “When one of the den’s operators discovered that people were building up, he showed up and people interrogated him. It was when he doesn’t want to talk that they started beating and hitting him with objects. He swallowed a gourd and said if they like they should kill him; he would not talk. By then the Nigeria Police has come to intervene. They were four in number that were apprehended two were built alive, Army arrested one and Police also arrested another one. Four Automated Teller Machine (ATM) cards were recovered from one of them. He confessed that 28 persons are working in the den.”
The Commander of the Rapid Response Squad (RRS), Olatunji Disu, an Assistant Commissioner of Police, who arrived the scene around 3.40pm led his men to search the interiors of the canal.
Disu, after a fruitless search told journalists that a team of police experts and sniffer dogs would be sent to sniff out suspects and victims inside the canal.
‘’Two suspects have been set ablaze and one other rescued by the police while three suspects have so far been arrested.
‘’I have just spoken with the Commissioner of Police and a team of experts and sniffer dogs are on their way to fish out those still hidden inside the canal.’’
Ojokoro Local Council Development Area Chairman Hammed Tijani called calm, assuring that government is investigating the matter and whoever found culpable would be prosecuted.
Tijani, who visited the scene, appealed to the crowd to go about their normal businesses and allow police to do their job.
He urged them to cooperate with the police and other relevant agencies in apprehending other suspects.
He urged them to always be watchful and report suspecting people and activities to concerned agencies.
Wondering how such gory incident could be happening in such a busy and popular environment, Tijani implored the youth not take laws into their hands.
