Nigeria Records its Bloodiest Police Checkpoint Accident in Years

A commercial bus driver and his 18 passengers  idling at a police checkpoint  died following a crushing impact of a trailer coming from behind.

The crash happened at Lokpanta on the Umuahia-Enugu axis of the Port Harcourt Enugu Highway, Abia, on Thursday morning.  

According to initial reports, the truck driver lost control, and drove straight into the passenger bus, killing all.

Police checkpoints, legal or illegal, have become a clear and present hazard on major roads across the nation. Its casualties figures range from 2 to dozens.

The last of such auto accidents with a high body count occurred along the Owerri-Onitsha road in 2021. No fewer than 20 people died then.

The 2021 calamity motivated the House of Reps to move a motion for the police authorities to dismantle all illegal checkpoints in Nigeria.

But the bloodiest Nigeria has recorded so far happened in Lagos in August 2010. No fewer than 40 people lost their lives near Otedola Estate.

Then-IGP Ogbonna Onovo later that year banned all checkpoints all over Nigeria. The order lasted for a while, and checkpoints sprouted out again.

The victims of these accidents, especially the dead ones, include not just passengers, but also policemen, customs officers, and soldiers manning the checkpoints.

At times, the security agents that hazard their lives standing around angry passers-by that eventually grow into mobs.

The Thursday incident already provoked many. Drivers and other motorists blocked the road, and called on the police to fish out the cops working that beat.