Operators of hotels and guest houses in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, on Wednesday, bemoaned the alleged harassment of their guests and destruction of some of their properties during a raid said to have been carried out by officials of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission in Ibadan.
According to the operators of the hotels, the raid was carried out between Tuesday evening and the wee hours of Wednesday.
Some hotels along the Sango-Eleyele Road and others along the Mokola-Samonda Road were said to have been raided by the EFCC personnel.
It was alleged that the team from the anti graft agency stormed the premises of most of the hotels and forced their way into the rooms without presenting any search warrant or identity cards.
Some staff of the hotels were said to have been manhandled by officials of the Commission for questioning them about their mission.
At one of the hotels, the receptionist was held by the collar of his shirt and dragged into some of the rooms as they allegedly insisted on getting to the control panel in order to disable the CCTV.
One of the operators lamented the experience, saying that “They caused more damage because they broke down the doors of empty rooms despite having been given our occupancy chart.”
Another operator said, “They started kicking doors open; they were looking for CCTV. If this were America, I would have sued EFCC. But, this is Nigeria, if you sue EFCC, they would start targeting you. Nigerians behave with impunity.”
One of the senior staff in one of the hotels said, “What bothers me the most about what they did was that we are already making our accommodation reports to the Department of State Security. They asked us to be bringing detailed report every week. Every Tuesday, we forward our hotel returns to them and they are free to come anytime for general inspection. At times, they would come twice a week.
“We also make returns (list of guests) to the State Intelligence Bureau at Eleyele. We have dispatch book which they would sign immediately we bring our returns to them. But in this case, if the EFCC wanted to do any check, it is just a question of showing the warrant or their identity cards and we know our duty; we would have opened our doors. Even if they want to make arrest we cannot stop them. But they made a forceful entry into our premises which caused some damages to our properties.
“They came into my office; they forced the door open. They disrupted the TV setup. What I was made to understand was that they were looking for CCTV control. They wanted to disable the CCTV; I don’t know the reason why. They were asking for where the CCTV control is instead of asking for keys, they broke the door open. We have about 10 decoders, they dismantled them. They made arrest of one of our guests and seized some phones. We never had any encounter with EFCC before then.
“We record personal data of our guests. We submit the list of guests that sleep in the hotel to SIIB and DSS every week.
“My concern is that these are the people that are supposed to protect us and make us feel safe. How can they come like thieves in the night? They said they were going to shoot. The security opened the gate for them. They didn’t even go in through the front door. They went to harass cooks. What does the cook have to do with this? One of them hard a ‘skeleton key’ with which he opened some doors.”
One of the proprietors asked, “If the EFCC is coming for a search, shouldn’t they come with a warrant? If they had a warrant, you think my staff would not cooperate? But, you cannot say you are doing your job to destroy people’s properties and businesses. That is the problem.”
A lady who claimed to have lodged with her boyfriend in one of the hotels that were raided on Wednesday took to the social media to relay her experience.
According to her, around 3am, two men barged into her room saying that they were EFCC operatives and asking them to bring their phones.
The lady, who said that her boyfriend engaged in crypto currency, explained that she was scared because he was always very nervous.
She said, “They started searching my boyfriend’s phone and one asked if I was his girlfriend or wife. I decided to seize the opportunity to make small talks and jokes and told him I’m his girlfriend but I’m on the way to becoming his wife. He laughed and asked why he hasn’t married me yet, I said (we had) no money. He said but we had money for a hotel, I said hotel money is ‘shikini nau officer,’ we want a big wedding.
“He laughed and said we must marry o, I said definitely and I’d even send an invite to them. He laughed and asked his colleague to give my man his phone back because of me. That they should move on to other rooms.
“They broke (into) every single room. They raided all rooms and packed a lot of guys and girls (and) drove their cars away too, beat some, punished some; it was horrible.”
Her thread had since sparked reactions from her followers with someone asking, “Why will @officialEFCC officers be acting like rogues? What happened to intelligence gathering, going to a location and requesting your suspect to open their door or talk to the hotel owners? Why are you going around attacking innocent people because of few criminals?”
However, the Ibadan Zonal Office of the EFCC did not give a clear response to the allegations by the affected guests, management and staff of the raided hotels.
Speaking with our correspondent on the telephone on Wednesday, Olumide Egbodofo, an official at the Public Relations Unit of the EFCC in Ibadan, denied knowledge of the alleged raid and seizure of mobile telephone sets from guests at hotels in the city.
He said, “What is it about the raid?What do you want from me? You want to know whether we broke into those hotels? There was nothing like that; I am not aware of that. I cannot ascertain that.”
Asked to confirm the alleged seizure of mobile phones of some hotel guests, he said, “I am not aware of that.”
