Since the Akwa Ibom State Government banned commercial motorcycles in Uyo, the capital, residents have been having a hard time coping with the activities of robbers and other criminals.
Many residents have lost their possessions to armed robbers while commuting in commercial tricyles, the alternative means of transportation in the city.
Recounting her experience to Social activist in Uyo, one of the victims, Kindness Effiong, 24, said, “We were only two passengers in the tricycle, a woman and myself. We were heading to Nwaniba. The tricycle had hardly moved a short distance when a man beckoned on the rider, walked up to him and asked to be taken to Osongama Housing Estate. The rider then proceeded to Osongama without seeking our consent.
“Immediately the tricycle got to a secluded area, the man began to drag our bags. As we struggled to wrest the bags from him, he brought out a gun and pointed it at us. We surrendered everything we had to him. The robber and the rider ordered us to get down from the tricycle and they zoomed off.”
Another victim, Bassey Okon, who was seen at the MTN office trying to retrieve a SIM card, told our correspondent that he was robbed inside a tricycle on Aug. 17.
Okon had thought that roads in Uyo were safe, since motorcycles had been banned and policemen patrolled various parts of the city. But he discovered soon enough that he was wrong.
He said, “I closed late from work that day at about 8.15 pm. I boarded the tricycle to Nsikak Eduok Junction. Midway I was robbed of all I had. I had to trek home that day.”
When he was contacted for his reaction to the development, the chairman of the Akwa Ibom branch of the Tricycles Association of Nigeria, Mr. Sunny Enang, did not rule out the possibility that robbers were using tricycles to attack their victims and dispossess them of their belongings.
He said, “Some hoodlums attempted to rob a local government agent who was selling tickets. They used one tricycle operator. We were able to apprehend some of them. When we took them to the police station, the tricycle rider said the hoodlums had pretended as if they were normal passengers. He did not know they were robbers. Sometimes, when it happens like this, some of these tricycle operators are helpless and they can do nothing about it.”
But Enang noted that there were some bad eggs among commercial tricycle operators in Uyo whose sole intention was to engage in criminal activities.
“Some of those who were using motorcycles to commit crime are here with us. We are still trying to re-orientate them. If somebody has a criminal motive in doing anything, that person will surely be caught. We are pleading with them not to use tricycles for criminal activities. We are all out to fish out the bad eggs,” he said.
He said that TAN had a problem with harmonizing the various tricycle riders’ bodies in Akwa Ibom until the latter agreed to unite, thereby making it easy to tag every tricycle operating in the city.
Enang was optimistic that the measure would serve as a check to anybody desiring to use tricycles for crime.
Meanwhile, the police in Akwa Ibom rescued four babies from traffickers and kept them in the custody of a government-owned orphanage in the state.
Two of the babies were rescued from the home of a suspected child trafficker, Mfon Etuk, in Idoro, Uyo Local Government Area, while the other two were rescued from buyers in Port Harcourt.
The suspect was arrested by detectives of the Police Anti-Kidnapping Squad.
Similarly, a resident of Ikot Akpan community, Mrs. Roseline Asuquo and her five children, were rescued from kidnappers and a Toyota RAV4 Sport Utility Vehicle belonging to her was also recovered from the criminals.
In a related development, a visitor to Uyo, Akwa Ibom State, Mr. Ndem Asuquo, narrowly escaped death when some hoodlums attacked him for daring to rescue a girl that was being assaulted outside the premises of the Akwa Ibom State Transportation Corporation.
Social activist learnt that the girl was used as a bait to attract and rob passersby.
Ndem, who is based in Port Harcourt, was attacked with sticks, knives and bottles immediately he moved close to the girl and her ‘assailants.’
He said, “I saw some men beating a girl and I thought the action was improper. So, I went to mediate. But the girl suddenly disappeared. Instead of the two men that were beating her, I saw six others.
“They rushed at me with weapons. One of them stabbed me with a knife. They were about to drag me away when some policemen arrived and they ran away.”
A security man at the park told Social activist that if the men had succeeded in dragging Asuquo away from the public glare, he would have been robbed and probably killed.
“He was lucky that the policemen came. If they had dragged him farther, there is no way he would have survived. Those boys are mean. They are killers. They do things and nobody dares to challenge them,” he said.
But the Police Public Relations Officer in the state, Mr. Etim Dickson, ruled out murder.
He said, “We can’t accept that many people have been killed when they come into the state. If a few people have experienced problems, it is different from being killed.
“With the strategy that the police have put in place in the state, it will be difficult for anybody or group of people to drag away anybody and murder him. It is not possible.”
Dickson urged every resident of Uyo not to panic as the police would do everything possible to protect lives and property.
The Commissioner of Police, Mr. Umar Gwadabe, on Friday in Uyo, said the police would not relent in their efforts to fight criminals in Akwa Ibom on all fronts.
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