A student, Olawale Ayomide, has accused police officers attached to the Igbeba Police Station in the Ijebu Ode area of Ogun State of extorting ₦99,000 from him during a road stop.
Olawale said the incident happened on Tuesday while he was driving his mother’s vehicle from Sagamu to Ijebu-Ode. According to him, the officers stopped his car, accused him of driving without a number plate, and later demanded money before releasing him.
He explained that despite telling the officers that the car belonged to his mother, who was still processing the vehicle’s registration documents, they ignored his explanation and insisted he follow them to their station.
“I was heading to Ijebu-Ode from Sagamu when I encountered some policemen along the road. They stopped us and asked my friend and me to step out of the vehicle. The car belongs to my mum, and she’s currently processing its documents,” he said.
“Without telling us our offence, they entered the car and ordered us to follow them to their station. On our way, they said we were driving a car without a number plate. We explained and even offered to call my mum to confirm ownership, but they refused and insisted on taking us to the station.”
Olawale alleged that the officers demanded ₦1 million to release them but later reduced the amount to ₦100,000 after negotiations.
“Since they wouldn’t let us go, I called my phone dealer and told him to help me sell my second phone so he could send the money. When I got the alert, the officers took me to a PoS terminal where I transferred ₦99,000 to them,” he added.
Another student, Dare Ifeanyi, who was with Olawale at the time, alleged that the officers took them to a nearby police station and forced them to write false statements.
“They asked us to deny that they collected money from us and to claim we were Internet fraudsters. They also told us to say the vehicle didn’t belong to our mum but that we bought it for ₦5 million from the proceeds of fraud. We refused at first, but they threatened to detain us, so we did as they said,” Ifeanyi stated.
The two students were eventually released but later discovered a police cap left behind in the car by one of the officers.
“We found the cap on the back seat when we got home and explained everything to Ayomide’s mum,” he said.
Olawale’s mother, Mrs. Omolabake, confirmed ownership of the vehicle and expressed her anger over the incident.
“I saw the cap in the vehicle and asked my son where it came from. At first, he didn’t want to tell me until I persuaded him. My name is on the car’s documents, and we are still processing the plate number. I felt bad when I heard they forced them to lie against themselves,” she said.
“My husband is not around, but once he returns, we’ll go to the station. They must refund the money and delete the video they recorded.”
An activist and the Coordinator of the Take It Back Movement in Lagos, Adekunle Taofeek, shared details of the alleged extortion on X (formerly Twitter), posting a picture of the recovered police cap.
“Some policemen extorted my brother along the Ijebu Ode road yesterday. They collected ₦100,000 illegally from him. He was forced to sell his phone at gunpoint to pay them. Along the line, they forgot their cap inside his car. Is that not kidnap for ransom?” Taofeek wrote.
As of the time of filing this report, efforts to reach the Ogun State Police Command spokesperson, Omolola Odutola, were unsuccessful. Calls to her phone were not answered, and messages sent to her line were yet to receive a response.
The incident adds to a growing list of complaints from Nigerians alleging extortion and harassment by police officers across the country. Earlier this year, another young man, Ramadan Adenola, also known as Netrovert, accused officers of the Nigeria Police Force of extorting him and a colleague during a stop-and-search operation in Lagos.
