Lagos industrialist accused police monitoring team of colluding with Chinese national to defraud him

LAGOS industrialist Emmanuel Madumere has accused two officers of the inspector-general of police's monitoring team of extortion and connivance with a Chinese national to defraud him on two occasions of sums of $58,000 and N18m ($43,230).

Coming at  time when the Nigeria Police Force is facing all sorts of accusations of high level corruption, including collusion with drug cartels, the latest news is devastating for the inspector-general of police (IGP) Usman Baba. Mr Madumere stated that he asked the foreigner, Eric Bing, to supply him three four-foot containers of 11 tonnes of speaker wires at the rate of $1.47 per roll in 2012.

However, after delivery of the consignment and payment of N18m for clearance at the ports, Mr Madumere said a substantial part of the products, totalling 27,832 rolls, were fake. Mr Madumere said he returned the products to Mr Bing’s company with an agreement that he would refund him for the loss, which stood at $84,310, as well as the sum of  N18m, the cost of clearing the goods at the ports.

Consequently, Mr Madumere said he reported the matter to the police but said Chief Superintendants of Police Dalatu Usman and Clifford Agboji attached to the IGP monitoring team, aided Mr Bing. He alleged that the policemen freed the foreigner and extorted him of N2m under the guise of investigating the matter.

Mr Madumere has now sent a formal petition to the IGP and the Police Service Commission, dated February 17, 2022. In his petition, he added that to his greatest surprise, rather than the police make Mr Bing pay or charge him to court, they let him off the hook, only refunding him a paltry sum of $10,000.