In a statement issued on Saturday, Nwapa described the attack on Soweto as “a deliberate act of state terror,” insisting it was not an accidental outcome of policing.
A revolutionary activist, Francis Nwapa, has accused the Lagos State Commissioner of Police, Moshood Jimoh, of personally leading an alleged premeditated, deliberate, brutal assault on activist Hassan Taiwo Soweto during a recent protest against eviction, demolition, and land grabbing in Lagos communities.
In a statement issued on Saturday, Nwapa described the attack on Soweto as “a deliberate act of state terror,” insisting it was not an accidental outcome of policing.
He noted that following the granting of bail to Soweto, graphic evidence had emerged showing the extent of violence inflicted on the activist under the direct command of the commissioner.
“The brutal assault on Comrade Hassan Taiwo Soweto during the anti-eviction, anti-demolition, and anti–land-grabbing protest in Lagos was not an accident of policing; it was a deliberate act of state terror personally led and participated in by CP Moshood Jimoh,” Nwapa said.
According to him, eyewitness accounts and visible injuries indicate that the police commissioner did not only issue orders but “personally joined his men in beating Soweto to a pulp.”
He decried the fact that Soweto was repeatedly beaten, kicked to the ground, and brutalised while defenceless.
Nwapa further claimed that Soweto’s hands were handcuffed behind his back, his clothes torn and used to blindfold him, describing the act as “humiliation and torture,” before he was forcefully taken to the State Criminal Investigation Department, Panti, Yaba.
“There, Soweto was thrown into a cell and deliberately denied food and water, further subjecting him to inhumane and degrading treatment,” he said, adding that the incident amounted to torture rather than lawful arrest or crowd control.
The activist also alleged that the violence extended beyond Soweto, affecting other protesters and residents in Oworoshoki, Makoko, and Owode-Onirin.
He claimed that elderly men and women, infants, and peaceful demonstrators were tear-gassed, shot at with live ammunition, and beaten indiscriminately.
“Several victims were shot in the leg, and many remain hospitalised. Some did not survive. These were unarmed civilians exercising their right to protest,” Nwapa stated.
He accused the Lagos State Police Command under Jimoh’s leadership of acting “as a private army for land grabbers and powerful interests,” adding that the alleged pattern of repression, killings, maiming, and torture amounted to crimes against humanity.
“If a senior police officer can act with such open savagery, one can only imagine the trail of abuses committed throughout his rise in the force,” Nwapa said, alleging that the commissioner’s “hands are stained with the blood of innocent Nigerians.”
He called for the immediate removal of CP Moshood Jimoh and demanded his prosecution for crimes against humanity in line with international law and the Geneva Conventions.
“Justice must be served for Soweto, for the injured, for the dead, and for all communities resisting forceful eviction and land grabbing in Lagos State,” Nwapa said.