There was a mass protest on Wednesday by commercial motorcyclists in Akure, the Ondo State capital, following the killing of one of them by a policeman.
Trouble began when two persons on a commercial motorcycle were knocked down by a Peugeot J5 bus along Arakale Road and died on the spot.
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It was gathered that commercial motorcyclists at the scene descended on the driver of the vehicle.
But a policeman guarding a nearby petrol filling station while trying to disperse the crowd shot in the air but the bullet from his rifle hit one of the motorcyclists.
This aggravated the protest as the angry riders attacked the policeman who was later rescued to a nearby police station.
The angry motorcyclists remobilised to the station and destroyed it.
Residents of the police barracks and policemen on duty fled through the back gate.
The protesters barricaded the dual carriage and set bonfire, causing gridlock on the road for several hours.
Confirming the incident, a spokesperson for the police in the state, Fumilayo Odunlami, explained that the policeman shot into the air to escape when the protesters attempted to mob him.
She said, “It was a road accident in which a woman driving a car hit and killed a commercial motorcyclist. Then a crowd gathered at the scene and was trying to mob the woman.
“The policeman then approached the scene to disperse the crowd and rescue the woman, but the angry crowd mobbed him. It was while he was trying to escape that he shot into the air and accidentally misfired.”
She said the injured cop had been receiving treatment at an undisclosed hospital while an investigation into the incident had begun.
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