The Lagos State judicial panel investigating accusations of police brutality on citizens and shooting at the Lekki Toll Plaza has found about six bullet casings at the toll gate.
The discovery comes after Amnesty International insisted Nigeria’s security forces opened fire on peaceful protestors killing and injuring a number of people.
Both the country’s army and the police have rejected Amnesty’s allegation, with the police saying 22 of her officers were killed by rampaging protesting youths.
In fact, a former spokesman of the Nigerian army Brigadier General Sani Usman had on Thursday told ARISE News that blank bullets were used to disperse protesters.
“If you look at the canisters, they were blank ammo and blank ammo don’t even kill. At a close rang – maybe 100-metres – maybe it will have some pigmentation on your skin,” Usman had said.
But members of the judicial panel have been visiting the site as part of their investigation and were shown around by representatives of the Lekki Concession Centre, which runs the gate.
The representatives are Abayomi Omoruwa and Gbolahan Agboluaje. They had earlier appeared before the judicial panel on Friday.
Members of the panel took pictures of where they found them and used paper to pick up the casings.
They were also shown around the burnt outbuilding which houses the control room in charge of the CCTV footage.
The Lekki Concession Centre boss, Omoruwa, said that despite rumours of their removal, CCTV cameras are mounted in position.
However, the panel did not receive the CCTV footage but said the main assignment for the day was to visit the incident site.
By Abel Ejikeme