Indian narrates ordeal with Abuja ‘agberos’

An Indian, Mr Sanjay Kumar Singh, was allegedly manhandled by some men parading themselves as road officials in Abuja.

Mr Singh told City & Crime that as he was being driven by his chauffeur, they stopped at a traffic light in Maitama and then three people popped up, asking for vehicle particulars.

He explained that as the light signalled them to move, “The men started demanding money. They blocked our vehicle and started vandalising it. They removed the number plate. They opened the car door and one of them sat on one of my staff’s laps. One of them removed me from the car before they seized the car from my driver.

“We were marched to their office despite pleading with the traffic police to come to our rescue. Instead, the police officers asked us to obey them.”

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He further said that at the office of the “agberos”, their tyres were flattened and they again asked them to buy some tickets despite presenting similar documents the vehicle secured in Kano State.

He said, “They insisted that we must buy their own, and threatened that if we failed to comply, they would not give us our vehicle dossiers back.

“The extortion continued as they asked that we patronised their own tickets at the rate of N200 for 365 days, totalling N73,000.

“However, they later settled for N35,000. At that moment we were convinced it was just daylight robbery.’’

When our reporter contacted the FCT police spokeswoman, Josephine Ade, on the incident, she did not pick our call or reply to an SMS.