Graphic Photo: Soldiers Damage Eye of FRSC Official in Lagos
An official of the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), Segun Enikuemehin, who dared to ask some soldiers who were assaulting a civilian to desist from such a dastardly act is currently at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LUTH) with one of his eyes totally damaged. According to Sahara Reporters, the incident happened on Sunday August 14th. Segun saw some military officers beating a harmless civilian. Worried that the officers could kill the man with the beating they were giving him, he approached the soldiers and pleaded that they stop beating the man and take him to the nearest police station if he had done something illegal.
The military men would not take such effrontery lightly as they descended on him and started beating him as well.
But not even the beating from the soldiers would discourage Segun as he was able to amidst his own beating, rescue the already battered man whom he then took to the Adekunle Police station at Ebute Metta. Eyewitnesses say Segun afterwards led some police officers back to the venue of the incident. Upon sighting him in the company of the policemen, the soldiers, who were by that time already cooling off at a nearby beer parlor, became even enraged and descended on him during which they pluckedout his eye and threw it on the ground. The damaged eye was picked from the ground and Segun was imemmdiately rushed to the General Hospital. Rejected upon arrival by that hospital, the blinded man reportedly asked that he be taken to LUTH.
Meanwhile, the soldiers, upon realizing what they had done, were said to have taken to their heels but were overtaken by residents and handed over to the police.
When a relative of the stabbed Federal Road Safety Officer went back to the police station, he discovered that the soldiers had already been released by the police. While still digesting that development, one of the accused soldiers walked into the station in the company of a senior officer who was identified as Captain Okoli.
Segun’s Uncle, Prince Ojatunwse Oluwajoba, who spoke on the incident, said the DPO of Adekunle Police Station informed him when he got there that the soldier who stabbed his nephew had been handed over to the military authorities.
He said that soldier, who had been in civilian clothes when the incident happened, arrived at the police station with Captain Okoli to collect his identity card and other personal effects that had been taken from him at the station. He added that doctors at LUTH are now saying his nephew’s left eye has been completely damaged and that the second eye might be affected as well if proper medical care is not given.