Sometime last year, I arrived in Lagos for an event and there was bad traffic from the airport as roads were being constructed. It was also raining heavily and the driver decided to do a detour that made us somehow end up in Bariga.
We were at an intersection without functioning traffic lights, but there was this traffic policeman was working hard to organize things despite the rainfall. Without him, we would have been there for hours and become sitting ducks to robbers. There were many such cases reported.
I still remember that policeman doing the thankless job at almost 7 pm that evening. He didn't have any supervisors breathing down his neck, he was just doing his job. That same evening, we ran into SARS operatives at Ligali Ayorinde on the way to my hotel. Same Police Force.
The SARS guys were not helping reduce traffic congestion but profiting from it. They stopped a number of people before us and for some reason, they let us go. I was thinking a lot that day about the contrast between the helpful traffic policeman and the arrogant SARS guys.
What makes one person helpful and another a predator? The answer was ”weapons.” Without the guns and high-handedness, the SARS operatives will be ignored on Nigerian streets. The true problem is with people who weaponized them for a reason and let them go rogue.
All of this SWAT talk is still focussing on weapons. We have not learned from the past. People at the top are probably making money from these weapons supplies and that is why there is a perverse incentive for SARS to use them. It is a cycle that never stops.
Cut off the weapons supplies to police and we will have peace. Having too many assault rifles on our streets has a consequence and the consequence is SARS.
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