A suspected motorcycle thief was lynched and set ablaze by a mob on Tuesday along Ibrahim Kashim Road in Makurdi, the Benue State capital.
According to eyewitnesses, two passengers had hired a commercial motorcyclist, popularly known as an okada rider, to take them to the railway quarters within the city. On arrival, an accomplice who had been waiting at the spot joined the group.
An eyewitness, Andrew Tergu, told reporters that while pretending to pay the rider, one of the suspects attacked him with scissors, stabbing him several times. As the rider collapsed and cried out for help, the suspects attempted to flee with his motorcycle.
“Unfortunately, as they tried to zoom off, the last person on the motorcycle fell down, and people pounced on him, dragged him to the main road, and set him on fire,” Tergu recounted.
By the time police officers and staff of the Benue State Sanitation Agency arrived, the suspect had already been killed and his remains were being evacuated.
The spokesperson of the Benue State Police Command, SP Udeme Edet, confirmed the incident, revealing that the suspect had only recently been released from the Makurdi Correctional Centre, where he had served a sentence for a similar crime.
“Immediately we received the report, the command promptly sent a team of officers there, but before they could get there, some people around had set him ablaze. We later discovered that the victim was recently released from a correctional centre, where he was jailed for the same offence,” Edet said.
She condemned the act of jungle justice, stressing that the command would no longer tolerate such extra-judicial killings.
