Four days after the arrest of a wanted Boko Haram member in Ikorodu area of Lagos, another suspect from a different group has been arrested in the same community for planning to bomb the Third Mainland Bridge in the state.
Police authorities in Abuja have identified the suspect caught with dynamites as 43-year-old Abiodun Amos, also known as Senti.
“Arms and ammunition recovered in connection with the crime are two cartons of explosive devices, 125 detonators and two AK 47 rifles,” says police spokesman, DCP Don Awunah, in a statement.
Awunah described the suspect as an explosives expert who could assemble and modify large scale Improvised Explosives Devices (IED) for terrorist act.
Amos was also described as an Ijaw native of Arogbo, from Ese-Odo Local Government of Ondo State and a leading member of a Niger Delta Militant Group, operating from the creeks of Ikorodu and Arepo areas of Lagos and Ogun states.
He was arrested by operatives of the Inspector General of Police’s Intelligence Response Team (IRT), who allegedly trailed him to a river bank at the Majidun area of Ikorodu, in Lagos.
According to the police, the two AK47 rifles in Amos possession were hidden in a big bag. He later led detectives to a vehicle parked somewhere in Ikorodu, from where dynamites and detonators were recovered from the boot.
Amos arrest was hastened by intelligence report from the office of the National Security Adviser to the President (NSA) which was passed on to the Inspector General of Police (IGP) Ibrahim Idris, indicating that the group was at his final stage of carrying out an attack on the Third Mainland Bridge.
The leader of the militant group, known as General Ossy Ibori, was suspected to have coordinated most of the bank robberies and several high profile kidnappings, including that of three school girls, at Babington Macaulay Junior Seminary School in Ikorodu, four landlords at Isheri North Area of Lagos; Oniba of Ibaland, Oba Goriola Oseni among others, within Lagos and Ogun.
The Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lt.-Gen. Tukur Buratai, had announced on Saturday the arrest of a fleeing Boko Haram terrorist in Ikorodu area of Lagos.
He made the announcement while making a remark, before Governor Kashim Shettima of Borno State cut the tape to re-open two major roads that were closed since 2013 at the height of the atrocities of the insurgents.
God wil continue to arrest them one after the other.
Due respect should be given to our men in uniform, they are carrying out their operations diligently and expertly.