Kogi State Bank robbery: How woman led deadly gang
Ayingba, which is a university town, is the hub of commercial and business activities in the eastern senatorial district of the state. When Weekly Trust visited the town on Thursday, October 29, which was a day after the incident, the town was a ghost of its former self. Business activities in many of the banks […]
Ayingba, which is a university town, is the hub of commercial and business activities in the eastern senatorial district of the state. When Weekly Trust visited the town on Thursday, October 29, which was a day after the incident, the town was a ghost of its former self. Business activities in many of the banks in the town were at low ebb. The incidence claimed a renowned youth leader in the area known as Salisu Rambo.
The walls of the first-generation bank were riddled with bullets from gunshots by the robbers whom our reporter learned kept shooting sporadically. A source also told Weekly Trust that such shootings were better watched on a TV screen. A police source said when the Divisional Police Officer got information about the robbery, he directed that all the exit ways from Ayingba should be blocked. The Ayingba-Ankpa-Enugu road was blocked with a truck, including the Idah-Ejule-Enugu road.
But after the robbers had completed their operation inside the banking hall and discovered that their exit routes had been blocked, they drove through the university gate at the western axis. It was learnt that they continued shooting from the bank’s premises through the university in the two buses they used for the robbery. In that process, some cars that had been parked on the way had their windscreens smashed and some innocent persons suffered from stray bullets.
This correspondent was informed that the only woman among them was carrying a chain bullet on her neck and was the one doing the shooting. Sources said that a police squad that was coming with the Area Commander from Idah stopped at Ejule junction when they learned that the robbers were heading towards Ejule road.
According to one of the sources, the first vehicle conveying the robbers passed, and the second one on noticing that some persons were trailing them, stopped at a village called Agbeji on the outskirts of Ayingba along Ejule road. It was at this point that Salisu Rambo and his squad ran into the stationary vehicle, and he got killed almost instantly while his youth members were wounded. The boys, known as Solo and Alapa, later died in the hospital.
Another police source told Weekly Trust that the policemen that had been trying to ambush the robbers at Ejule road moved into action at this point. The superior fire power of the police subdued the robbers, some of who ran into the bush, two were killed and one was arrested with two laptops, one AK47 rifle and some documents from the bank. The first bus carrying some of the robbers had already escaped.
The acting Commissioner of Police in Kogi State, Alhaji Abdullahi Magaji, while appealing to traditional rulers in Lokoja yesterday, said the criminals do not operate in isolation, adding that there are some inner members who could be feeding them with information. He also pointed out that that the society belongs to all of us and not the police alone, so people should always give useful information about suspicious movements in the neighbourhood. He said the arrested robber has been giving useful information which has led to the recovery of some ammunition from a village called Ogiri near Nsukka in Enugu State, saying those involved in the bank robbery at Ayingba would be caught eventually.
This robbery incident which occurred shortly after the other one in August on another first-generation bank in Ayingba has naturally given the police the reason to conduct serious review of our safety and security systems and the processes of bank operation, a commercial driver, Adah Usman, said. Ayingba has recently become a fertile ground for unchecked robbery operations.
First Bank Plc was the first to be attacked followed by UBA and now Afribank. And in all, policemen have formed the major casualties. One Usman asked how the robbers knew that money was coming into the bank. Our reporter gathered that bullion van going to Ayingba from Lokoja with UBA money had to be diverted for safety reasons.