We are all witnesses to the carnage that has been brought on our land Nigeria and Lagos in particular within the past four days. This is a collection of facts which have been pieced together by expert analysis, site visits, ballistic and forensic examination, intelligence reports and fact-finding carried out within the last three days. There will be specific references to timelines and events referenced by the press both local and international to uncover the real events in the Lekki theatre of the absurd.
Every reader is urged to interact with this material with an open mind, interrogate freely and VERIFY every statement here independently. Some of the issues raised are already in the public space. HASHTAG ENDSARS The #ENDSARS protests grew out of the high-handed brutality of the police force three weeks ago. The focal point was the disbandment of the notorious police Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS). It was a very organised and peaceful protest. Stationed strategically at the upscale Lekki neighbourhood, it quickly attracted the attention of celebrities, social media influencers and media nationally. It was a rallying point for youth who were tired of deliberate negative profiling, indiscriminate arrests and extra judicial killing of the youth by the disbanded police unit. Crowdfunded and supported by other interests groups like Feminist Coalition, it became a movement as its hashtag gathered a million mentions and Twitter created its own icon.
By the second week, #ENDSARS became the number one hashtag for a cause on Twitter. Meanwhile, the movement insisted on zero leadership and openended protest as against the normal protest-dialogue cycle. Since the protest started in Lagos State, the Governor of Lagos State went to the site at Lekki Toll Gate and listened to the protesters. Despite a charged atmosphere in which verbal and physical missiles were thrown, he identified with the movement and reiterated the need to have leadership and articulate their demands so he could convey it to the president. He also met with the protesters in the front of his office in Alausa who subsequently presented the demands of the movement for onward delivery to the President. In Alausa, RRS policemen were detailed to protect the protesters. The Governor proceeded to Abuja and presented the demands to the President and met with the IG to shore up police presence in Lagos so that there WOULD NOT BE BREAKDOWN OF LAW AND ORDER. The IG agreed to send additional units of the Police Mobile Force Units to support the efforts in Lagos. Please note my last statement. Lagos was expecting Police Mobile Force Units.
The Governor returned to Lagos and set up a panel of enquiry into police brutality and a fund to compensate victims of police brutality. This was set up by a state that has no control over the operations of the police, their command and control, operations and all. As at today [10:15 am, 23/10/2020] most states have set up a panel of enquiry but very fe have set up a compensation fund. The Panel is Lagos state is empowered to write a cheque immediately to the victim of police brutality. Members of the #ENDSARS movement were invited to join the panel but BECAUSE THE MOVEMENT HAD NO LEADERSHIP, they have not joined. By midweek of last week, the #ENDSARS MOVEMENT had become a source of embarrassment to the Federal Government as several international actors, envoys, governments and international organisations were putting pressure on the federal government to listen to the demands of the protesters. International news coverage had also become a nagging headache to the Federal Government. It had also become a contentious matter as parts of the country opined that it was a sectional attempt to delegitimise the government and seek regime change.
The government was definitely uncomfortable with the traction of the protest movement. Although Governors and the Vice President had spoken to the protesters and accepted their R5R requests, the protesters were asking for the president to assure them that concrete steps would be taken beyond announcing the disbandment of the SARS Units nationwide. The disbandment had been announced by the IG but the announcement lacked credibility because the same announcements had been made three times before and the impunity continued.
INTELLIGENCE GATHERING
On Thursday the 15th of October, the powers in the Presidency asked the Chief of Defense staff to submit a plan to “peacefully” dislodge the protesters from the Lekki site. Please note that LASG was still hoping on the IG of Police for PMF reinforcement.
The Army echelon supposedly submitted a plan to dislodge the protesters. It is on record (in all major newspapers) that the Chief of Defense Staff attended a one-hour meeting with the President on Monday 19th October between 13:30 and 14:30 hours. There was no press release or statement after this meeting. Please check the Punch of Monday 19th and Tuesday 20th, October 2020. The meeting had no other attendee aside the President and the CDS. Without knowing the deliberations of the meeting, the LASG inferred that the meeting may have been about the Lekki situation and might involve the deployment of the military. The Governor of Lagos State announced a curfew on Tuesday the 20th of October at 11:00am to ensure that most citizens were off the streets in case more PMF units were deployed or the military was involved as rumoured.
The LASG was never in the know concerning the impending force to be used at the Lekki Toll Gate protesters. The Lagos State Government took the curfew decision to forestall the breakdown of law and order and to SAVE LIVES IF THE MILITARY WAS MOBILISED. The military is not trained to build peace, they are trained to keep and enforce peace. In most instances, they may be more brutal than the police; inferred the Lagos State Government. By 12:00 on Tuesday 20th October, LASG got feedback that people may be stranded due to the short window of the 11:00 to 16:00 timeframe to get back home. The government then extended the time to 21:00 hours before enforcement would begin. This was to ensure that more citizens would be out of harm’s way if the PMF forces were deployed or the military came to the streets as hinted by people in the intelligence community. At 17:00 hours, a retired Colonel of the Nigerian Army reported seeing a truck of the Nigerian Army, parked about 500 meters from the toll gate. He was surprised but made calls to find out if some officials of the government knew anything about soldiers’ deployment in Lagos. Nobody could give a satisfactory answer.
LEKKI TOLL GATE CONCESSIONAIRES
The Lekki Concession Company (LCC), a private organization sensed that the situation was tense for two reasons: The government had declared a curfew and they knew that some might resist and the use of force was a possible occurrence. They also knew that if everyone left, the toll gate would be deserted and no one would be able to protect their equipment especially low-lying REMOVEABLE EQUIPMENT. The infrared cameras used to match e-tags to number plates fall into this category. They were removed to avoid theft and vandalisation. If the curfew came into effect, there would be no cars to toll. Period! The company providing the LED SCREENS also decided that they would not want to suffer any loss from vandalisation if the curfew went into effect. They also did not want to be seen as encouraging people to stay at the toll gate in defiance of the curfew’ if they continued to provide entertainment. They put off their LCD SCREENS so people could go home.
There would be nobody to provide LCD services to after the curfew. Remember that staff of both the LCD providers and LCC also needed to get home in order to beat the curfew which was meant to start by 21:00 on Tuesday 20th October 2020. THE EXERCISE AND ITS OPTICS At a few minutes after 18:00 hours, a detachment of “soldiers” breached the perimeters of the protest ground and started shooting in the air. These created a stampede and the protest ground became a theatre of chaos and anarchy. Most people ran frantically but CURIOUSLY THERE WAS A VERY BRAVE RECORDER WHO FOLLOWED THE MILITARY AND DOCUMENTED THEIR SHOOTING WITH A STEADY HAND ON A PHONE CAMERA. Think about it. Go watch the video again! This person recorded at very close range and followed the soldiers towards the epicenter of the protest. Bravery or premeditation? The video has been subjected to several independent examinations and the result is constant: it was doctored. A few people have come out to independently say that it was overdubbed with gunshots aside other manipulative techniques.. CAMERAS AND VIDEOS It is clear that on the issue of the infra- red cameras, several people have recanted their bursts or outrage as they have now agreed that BOSCH cameras were removed, not CCTV cameras. Enough is Enough Nigeria (EIE) rebutted themselves on the CCTV matter.
Several other people and organisations have since become better informed. The CCTV of the plaza is mounted atop and could not have been vandalized or stolen. It would also require heavy equipment to reach. IT WAS NOT REMOVED The make of the infra red cameras is BOSCH. Independent search and research would verify this. As simple search of the pictures of the toll gate would reveal the position of the CCTV cameras. There was a video of a gun truck with a soldier happily firing at protesters. It was an old Nigerian Army footage of its war with Boko Haram. It was edited and stitched to a cut-away piece of people running helter skelter. They overdubbed panic soundtrack of “they are killing us” and posted it online.If there was a gun truck at that venue, it would have been seen and pictures would have been taken before and after the exercise. More importantly, the calibre of rounds it fires would ensure that we would have counted bodies by the hundreds.
The gun truck with a mounted automatic machine gun was never in Lekki on the said date. It was deliberate misinformation yet many believed it and retweeted the fake news. Several celebrities tweeted photos taken from movies, drama and past accidents. All have been debunked by the same people who were in the dramas or living people who said they did not die. Most were not even close to Lekki. Eniola Badmus was supposedly killed. She subsequently released a press statementthat she was not in Lekki and was alive, more importantly! There are several pictures below of people who were supposedly killed and have come out to say they did not die. A casual perusal of the social media space would reveal at least ten of such.
REVIEW OF THE MILTARY EXERCISE
Did the military have orders to storm the place, stop the “entertainment” and force people to leave using scare tactics. The exercise was to use BLANK AND TRACER BULLETS TO SCARE PEOPLE AND USE FEAR TO SEND THEM AWAY. THEIR PLAN was to have very few officers carrying live ammunition and most officers carrying tracer and blank rounds. If shot as close range, blank or tracer rounds will inflict a superficial injury but are RARELY life-threatening.
This was the plan of the military and it was NEVER SHARED WITH LASG. They shot in the air mostly, cleared the site and by 19:00 hours, they had left. Immediately the mayhem started, attempts were made to engage the military who gave their normal cold shoulders when they engage their exercises or operations: powers above! The short video of their operations was quickly downloaded and doctored by agents of anarchy. The sound was overdubbed with sound effects, panic scene sounds and uploaded on social media. On Instagram, DJ Switch live-streamed the confusion and chaos that reigned within the roughly 45 minutes of the operation. She showed people running helter skelter and captured the “shooting”. Her testimony enabled social media outrage which put the number of the dead at 79 initially and 48 subsequently. In a follow-up interview today, she stated that she “counted” 15 dead protesters during the shooting episode in which she was miraculously saved by a young boy who took a bullet for her.
It is curiously calm of her to have displayed the presence of mind to count the number of the dead under such testy circumstances. It is also odd that she was able to confirm that the bodies she counted were not wounded but dead. Did she wait to take their pulse and certify them dead? The forensic audit of the site contradicts her claims. The shells recovered from the site and displayed by her were mostly blank and tracer shells. Only one live but spent ammunition was visible. Obviously, it did not hit any target. Shells recovered by other witnesses have been verified as mostly blank and tracer shells. Videos of the event which she live streamed confirmed tracer shells being fired up in the air with their accompanying orange glow and blank shells being fired with their accompanying hollow sound. The Governor as his aides went to every hospital between 20:00 hours and 02:00 hours of the next day going to comfort the victims and seeking ways to help. The Governor specifically went to all hospitals where the wounded and supposedly “dead” were. Doctors in each hospital confirmed that there was no fatality YET AND that most injuries were superficial, except ONE blunt force injury who probably fell and hit his head. He subsequently passed on. May God help and bless his soul. Every morgue within ten kilometre radius of the Lekki toll gate was visited. There was no Brought in Dead (BID) bodies on that night from the Lekki Toll Gate.
THE MILITARY EXERCISE: CASUALTY AND MORTALITY
The military had a mission which would not have been aborted even if the governor got in touch with their echelon. Orders are orders. The LASG would not be in support the use of force against people with whom the governor had dialogued, whose cause he championed, whose envoy he had become. The Military took its own decisions within its chain of command up to the C in C and did not inform the LASG. Maybe we could have averted the tragedy if they had consulted. The military, it was alleged took away bodies of the dead at the Lekki Toll Gate. At least fifteen individuals cannot be missing and we would not have bodies deposited in morgues or families asking questions. They cannot be kept in military trucks for ever as they will decompose and cause a huge stench. Were they summarily interred? How could anyone have missed the truck that carried 15 bodies away from Lekki? Nobody could video or photograph the truck before or after the event? Not even our documenter in chief, DJ Switch! We have gone to all hospitals and morgues to find out about fatalities from gunshot wounds on the night of 20th October 2020.
At at today, NONE! We have asked parents or guardians who lost anyone at the LEKKI Toll Gate to come out for verification. As at today: ONE PERSON MISSING! We have verified every claim of death on that nite and their last statements “his last words were peace and unity”. ALL have been debunked. Fifteen lives could not have been snuffed out and their families would have kept quiet. We are still waiting for members of the public who lost any member of their family in Lekki to please inform the LASG. It will help the cause of this investigation. While the use of disproportionate force against its citizens is regretted, it is clear that the Lagos State Government took steps to reduce any impending carnage. The military is not commanded by any governor. They made their plans and did not inform LASG. EVEN at that, they used blank bullets and tracers which wounded protesters regrettably.
However, information about this exercise was recorded, doctored and weaponised with misinformation to incite Lagosians against the government. An aerial shot of ARISE TV showed no blood stains attributable to a massacre on the roads of Lekki Toll Gate. A UV sweep of the Lekki Toll Gate showed no blood splatter patter n consistent with a massacre or mass casualty. It showed several individual droplet patterns consistent with “walking wounded” casualty. The installed CCTV will bear this out. CONCLUSION While we are trying to find out why the military did not carry the government along, we all know how that institution works. It is insular and take its own decisions. They are answerable only to their commanders up to the C IN C. We we must come to terms with the fact that there was shooting in Lekki but there was no Massacre in Lekki.
More celebrities and influencers have apologised for enabling the use of fake news for incitement. The facts simply do not add up to support the carnage that purportedly happened in Lekki. The Lagos State Government has set up an independent panel to investigate and is asking the youth to join in unravelling this puzzling event. This is what we have pieced together from all angles in the past 72 hours. Please feel free to verify and ask further questions. Most importantly, if any family has anyone who has been missing since Tuesday the 20th of October 2020, please get in touch with the Lagos State Government. We cannot allow 15 lives to be snuffed out without asking questions about their plight.
ADDITIONAL INFO
There are several photo and video evidences and recants on the internet but below are some links to help independent verification of facts.
https://twitter.com/12dddd3356/status/1319322503764992006?s=12 https://www.instagram.com/tv/CGlC3fjhYjP/?igshid=3pku54ykvl8e https://www.instagram.com/tv/CGpwqQVHV8i/?igshid=1aydigbiljb4i https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-54628292