It is as well good that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC has just banned its officials from sting operations at odd hours of the night. The new directive is said to be part of the measures by its chairman, Ola Olukoyede to align the agency with the newly revised procedure on the arrest and bail of suspects.
It is not clear whether the newly revised procedure was done before Olukoyede came into office or just after his recent appointment. Whatever the case, the commission has assured the public that it will not relent in its adherence to the rule of law in the exercise of its mandate. That appears reassuring.
Coming a day after the arrest last Wednesday of many students of the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife Osun State, by officials of the agency, the directive would seem targeted at dousing concerns raised by the manner that raid was conducted.
Officials of the commission had in a midnight raid, stormed the off campus hostels of the students, broke into their rooms and arrested those they saw there on suspicion of internet fraud. The raid which was said to have lasted between 1.30 to 4 am saw to the manhandling and subsequent arrest of about 70 students.
Insider sources gave a graphic account of the Gestapo and dehumanizing manner officials of the agency stormed the hostels; arrested students owning iPhones, laptops and cars. And in a trending video, about six vehicles were seen along with a white Hummer bus ferrying the students away from their hostels to the zonal office of the EFCC in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital.
The procedure and indiscriminate manner of the arrests did not go down well with the student union of the institution which quickly mobilized and stormed the zonal office of the agency to protest the action. The management of the university equally made some intervention to get at the root of the impasse.
But in its reaction hours later, the agency said it arrested 69 suspects. It listed their names but was silent on their identity as students. The agency claimed the arrests followed actionable intelligence on their suspected involvement in internet-related activities. It further claimed that credible intelligence linked the Oduduwa Estate where the suspects were arrested with activities of suspected internet fraudsters.
The management of the university was later to confirm that 58 of the students had been released to them while 11 others were profiled as having cases to sort out with the agency. There are speculations that those still with the agency may be taken to the courts after diligent investigations.
It was against this setting that the commission announced a day after the controversial raid that it has banned night sting operations by its officials. But as relieving as that directive is, it exposed inherent flaws in the way and manner the raid at the hostels of the OAU students was carried out.
The commission claimed its action was based on credible intelligence. Right! But it randomly broke into the rooms of students, frightened and woke them up from their sleep, only to arrest those owning iPhones, laptops and cars on suspicion of wire fraud. After profiling, nothing incriminating was found on 58 of them. That does not speak of credible intelligence which the commission claimed informed its action.
But 11 others were not all that lucky and are still in detention. They may be arraigned in the courts which have the final authority to determine their culpability. What seemed to have emerged from the figures is that a whopping 58 students were woken up from their sleep, harassed and whisked away to Ibadan for no just cause. They were tagged suspected internet fraudsters because they had expensive phones, laptops or own cars.
And the commissions talks of credible intelligence! Actionable intelligence that led to the arrest 69 students from their rooms only to discover that 58 of them had no business being arrested in the first instance is anything but credible. Yes, the commission may have had some information that some students in those hostels were into internet fraud. That possibility cannot be ruled out. Even in the larger society, we live and mingle with the good, the bad and the ugly. That does not give everybody away as suspects. How fair will it be to storm a street at night break into the homes of residents and arrest people indiscriminately just because some suspected criminals reside in that street? Credible intelligence would have detected the location of the actual residence of the suspects.
That is where the EFCC officials failed. If they were acting on intelligence, they would have availed themselves of the specific details of the suspects, their rooms and other relevant information to aid their apprehension either during the day or at any other time they may choose. That failed to happen.
Their response amounts to invading the privacy of the students and placing on them the burden of proving their innocence against internet fraud. There is everything wrong with this method of law enforcement.
But what is this fuzz about expensive phones, laptops and cars by students? Students all over the world are known for their high craze for fashion. Expensive shoes, dresses, wrist watches, phones and cars for those that can afford. Many of us today bought expensive shoes and dresses as dependent students. But the reality of it today is that even with improvements in our incomes, many will be reluctant to buy those expensive items because they can find value for their money elsewhere.
That is the irony of student life. Such inordinate tastes sometimes fuel crimes. But the leadership is to blame for not placing high premium on the right virtues and values that guide decent conduct. The youths take to all manner of criminalities because our system seems to encourage it through unbridled looting of our collective patrimony by public functionaries.
That is by no means to cover up rising criminality within the student population in wire fraud. Both students and all manner of youths even the not well educated ones are fully into it. But the assumption that the possession of expensive phones and laptops constitute actionable evidence of internet fraud loses sight of the emerging sophistication in Information and Communications Technology ICT.
Students need android phones, laptops for their assignments. Virtually every student needs such phones and laptops for their assignments, research and related academic engagements or pleasure. Parents buy these items for their children because they aid their studies.
If the possession of such electronic devices is now a prima facie evidence for internet fraud suspects, then our security agencies are still far from the realities of the times. The security agencies must through training and retraining programs update and align themselves to modern methods of internet fraud detection.
It is sometimes amazing the kind of ignorance depicted by some of our security officials at check-points. This writer was once asked by a police officer what he does with his laptop. The question came after I opened my car booth as demanded. He saw a bag inside it and demanded it be opened.
On seeing the laptop, he asked: what do you do with this laptop? I was taken aback by that question and did not have any immediate response. But inside my mind I was ruminating, what do you do with laptop? What do people do with laptop? What kind of question is this?
After a while, I answered him that I work with it. I was expecting him to ask what kind of work I do with it. But I moved fast to remind him that I even bought laptops for some of my children in higher institutions apparently to drive home the inappropriateness of the question. Why do you ask someone in my age what I do with laptop?
But in that question lies the ignorance and some of the limitations of our security operatives. It is the same mind-set that led the EFCC operatives into arresting any and every student they saw with iPhones, laptops and cars at the OAU hostel. It is the same sweeping generalization that has been the source of friction between the police and members of the public each time they ask people to unlock their phones for a search. Many have been fleeced by rogue policemen in the process. You are a suspected internet fraudster if you are seen with any of these items and the onus is on you to prove your innocence else?
There is everything wrong with such blanket profiling. At a time the country is assailed by all manners of insecurity, midnight raids for suspected internet fraud should be out of the way. The agency can perfectly do it job without the Gestapo and intimidating style deployed in the OAU incident and the ensuing backlash.
