Sanwo-Olu orders arrest of soldier taking one-way
Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu who on Tuesday, January 2, arrested a soldier and some commercial motorcyclists for driving against traffic on the Lagos-Badagry expressway has continued to receive commendations from Nigerians.
The governor arrested the traffic offenders while returning from the Lagos State University, Ojo where he commissioned a project sponsored by Chief of Staff to the President, Rt Hon. Femi Gbajabiamila.
Sanwo-Olu, on sighting the traffic offenders, stopped his convoy and went after the riders. While some of the riders ran and left their motorcycles and passengers, some were arrested by the governor’s team. One of them was a soldier, a Lance Corporal.
In a trending video, the soldier was seen telling the governor and his security aides that he was a soldier.
The sight of the soldier trying to justify why he should not be arrested because he was a soldier seemed to have rankled Sanwo-Olu who fired back at the soldier ‘that’s the more reason why I’m going to lock you up. I’m going to lock you up. Useless boy, you’re telling me you’re a soldier.
“Put him there; let your father come and rescue you. You’re telling me you are a soldier; that is the reason I am going to lock you up.”
The governor lampooned one of the passengers, a female, saying, “You people are the ones causing this. Maybe I should arrest two of you and put you in the guardroom. You are patronising Okada, and they are taking one way. Is it good? And they will hit you and you die; they will say the government killed you.”
Since the video went viral, many Nigerians have commended Sanwo-Olu for standing up for what is right. “This is the kind of leadership we need at all levels in this country, leaders who will go tough at impunity. A soldier in uniform committing traffic offence is bad enough. The same soldier justifying why he should flout the law because he is a soldier is a shame to his uniform and to the military as a whole,” wrote a man identified as Anthony Dibia on Instagram.
Another respondent to the video wrote: “This is why I don’t like the military; this notion that they are above the law. What impudence!”
