Dare-devil robbers early Thursday morning invaded a sub-community of Apete in Ido Local government of Oyo State, inflicting deep matchet cuts on not less than six persons and carted away valuable properties.
The robbers numbering about 20 robbed ten houses on Jamade street, opposite Goshen land in the Apete area.
Sources in the communities stated that the robbers arrived around 1am and robbed the houses including a Photogapher with the Guardian Newspaper, Najeem Raheem whose son, Faruk fainted as a result of the iron rod used on him by the men of the underworld when he put up resistance.
His father, Raheem had escaped by the whiskers from the attackers but the wife was not that lucky as she was matcheted on her hand by the men of the underworld.
A student hostel was also attacked in the area where no fewer than four students sustained matchet cuts with others inflicted with other varying degrees of injuries.
While the police were called severally according to residents, they reportedly did not get to the location until 1:30 minutes even though the distance between the Divisional Police Station, Apete to the crime scene should not take more than five minutes at around that time.
Investigations revealed that the house of an Islamic cleric who rears cows in the neighborhood, simply known as Adekunle, the house of a Lead City University lecturer and that of another staff of West African Examinations Council (WAEC) were among those robbed.
Some of the victims stated that the thieves, mostly young boys distributed themselves to the houses stealing laptops, phones and cash and also destroyed valuables.
The physically disturbed residents stated that the entire Apete, and particularly Yidi-Arola and Ariyibi communities have been under attacks by thieves since the partial lockdown of Oyo State due to Coronavirus pandemic.
While calling for security deployment to the area, a resident of the community who pleaded anonymity stated that “the police that came were even blaming residents asking them where they got the phones that were stolen by the thieves. This is the least we expected from Police who said they are our friends. In fact, some people called 615 released by government and other numbers. We didn’t get any response. In this community alone no fewer than 40 houses have been attacked with not less than 30 persons sustaining all sorts of injuries after losing valuables in the last one month”.
