traffic officials accused of issuing fake receipts in Lagos

A driver, Tajudeen Omoniyi and his boss,
Olusegun Dada, have accused some youths
working with the Alimosho Local Government
Area, Lagos State, of extorting money from him
(Dada) by allegedly issuing fake receipts for a
traffic offence they claimed was not committed.
Omoniyi told PUNCH Metro that he had reversed
from the premises of the MTN office in the
Egbeda area to the main road for a vehicle in
front of him to move out when he was arrested

He said the officials turned down his explanation
and insisted that he had violated the “highway
code”. He said he requested that they identify
themselves, but they declined and towed the car
to the council secretariat.
He said, “On Friday, October 16, my boss and I
went to the MTN office along Egbeda-Akowonjo
Road. We parked on the MTN premises; I tried to
tell them that I was waiting on the main road for
the car in front of me to come out of the
premises. But they did not listen.
“I begged them to allow me to call my boss
inside the MTN office. They refused, beat me up
and towed the car to their secretariat in
Akowonjo. We had to pay N10,000 before the car
was released and they gave us receipts without
number.”
Omoniyi’s boss, who is a lawyer, said the
officials did not state the offence his driver
committed, but he eventually agreed to pay the
fine to avoid trouble.
He said, “Those youths were hoodlums parading
themselves as officials. They deflated the two
front tyres of my car and damaged its bumper.
About 20 of them suspected to be under the
influence of alcohol took me to a corner and said
my driver had breached the highway code.
“They asked me to pay N25,000, but I said I
could not pay for an offence that was not
written. When they threatened to beat me up, I
offered them N5,000, but they rejected it.
Eventually, one of them collected N10,000 from
me and came back with a receipt that is not
numbered which I challenged. They also
collected N500 for the gate pass and I spent
another N1,000 to pump my tyres inside their
premises. I am suspecting the receipts are fake.”
The lawyer said his efforts to report the
perceived extortion to the Executive Secretary,
Mr. Jelili Sulyman, were frustrated by some
workers of the council.
He said, “I went to the local government
secretariat three times to report what happened
to the executive secretary but all my efforts were
rebuffed. I learnt that the officials were brought
in by the secretary as his henchmen and I can
identify them.”
However, the Coordinator of Traffic Operations,
Mr. Babatunde Saka, who spoke on behalf of the
secretary, said Omoniyi and his boss’ claims
were not true adding that the car was seized for
parking on the road.
He said, “Our duty is to sanitise the traffic and
we have ethics. None of our operatives goes out
without putting on their uniforms and identity
cards. We don’t tamper with seized vehicles. The
lawyer’s vehicle was towed on the road, not on
the MTN premises and we have a photograph to
that effect.
“The receipts are original and a pass needs to be
tendered to show that the owner of the vehicle
paid the fine.”
On the allegation that hoodlums were being used
as officials, Sulyman said, “That is not true. The
present political dispensation does not give room
for hoodlums to operate anywhere.”