PEOPLE’S EXPERIENCES
EBUKA OBI UCHENDU
The host of Big Brother Naija reality show Ebuka Obi Uchendu has disclosed a bitter personal experience he had with SARS in 2005
‘I can never ever forget’
“On the 14th of November 2015, just six days after I was called to
Nigeria Bar and two days after my elder brother’s wedding, I was driving in the Zone 1 area of Abuja with my friends Chisom and Ofem when an unmarked car drove ahead of us and blocked my car in front. Then a man in plain clothes came out from the car with a gun and pointed at us! Of course my instinct was they were armed robbers so I found a way maneuver and speed off. He jumped into his car and chased after us. I wasn’t sure where I was going but I kept driving and at some point, we found ourselves at the Olusegun Obasanjo way when we noticed he had chased us into an ambush laid by policemen but at least there was a police truck parked, six to ten men holding guns were blocking the road. Then what is still the most chilling moment of my entire life, we watched the men raise their guns at us and open fire. We found out later there were several reported robbery cases at the area at the time and our dead bodies would have been paraded as the guilty armed robbers. Now 15 years later on the 3rd of October 2020, a young man Joshua Ambrose, was allegedly thrown out from a moving car by members of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) in Ughelli in Delta state and that has sparked off the current protest. Thankfully, none of us in the car died that night in Abuja even though Ofem was hit by a bullet on his shoulder and he still carries the scare till this day. He has gone on to do so many things including being the MD of Smart City Lagos, while Chisom is now a leading presenter on Super Sports but many other Nigerians haven’t been as lucky as us to still be alive till this day and fulfil their dreams. Thousands more have been killed so when Nigerians talk about the end SARS with the hashtag on twitter, it’s not a current situation, it has been our reality for too long! Yes, the government has disbanded the police unit but even after that, more Nigerians (Jimoh Isiak, Ikechukwu) and so many more have been killed during this peaceful protest across the country even though government has given the police order to stand out as recently as yesterday, more lives were lost in Oshogbo. This is not a political movement it’s literally Nigerians telling the government to give them a chance to just be alive, it’s the most fundamental human right and everyone has earned that right so the government must be seen to be acting and not just speaking because as long as the words of those in authority don’t match with what Nigerians see on the screens, trust will continue to slip away and hopefully this does not continue to be the case.