The Assistant Inspector-General (AIG) of Police in charge of Zone 2, Olohundare Jimoh, has dismissed claims that the disbanded Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) has resurfaced under new tactical formations within the Nigeria Police Force.
His comments come amid renewed outrage over videos of police officers allegedly assaulting civilians, especially following the shooting of 28-year-old Mene Ogidi in Effurun, Delta State.
Speaking during an interview on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily on Friday, Jimoh maintained that the controversial unit remains dissolved, insisting that lessons from the #EndSARS protests continue to shape policing reforms across the country.
“The SARS has been disbanded, and there is no area where the Old SARS were migrated into another Squad or formation for them to do anything,” he said.
The senior police officer explained that former SARS operatives were not removed from the force because they were originally regular police personnel assigned to special duties before the unit was scrapped.
According to him, the officers were redeployed to other departments and subjected to retraining programmes focused on professionalism and human rights compliance.
“A lot of internal human rights organisations, including the Red Cross international, and others even participated in ensuring that we reshape the behaviour of all these personnel,” Jimoh stated.
“While I was CP Lagos, the Red Cross was in my office to ensure that those people who were rehabilitated in terms of performing their duty and ensuring that they continue to respect human rights and dignity and their behaviour is in contact with members of the public, conform with the international best practices, so they were very debriefed”.
Jimoh also argued that several police brutality clips currently circulating online were not recent incidents, claiming many dated back several years.
“Eventually, all the videos that you are seeing online, outside the incident that happened in Delta, are extremely old videos, some of them dated to about 5 to 6 years ago, that people are now tagging as something that just happened,” he said.
Despite his position, the AIG disclosed that the Inspector-General of Police had already constituted a special committee to review the viral footage and determine whether any fresh incidents of abuse were involved.
“If there is any recent case among them, those responsible will be identified and dealt with appropriately in line with the law,” he added.
Jimoh further appealed to Nigerians to avoid spreading unverified content online, warning that misinformation could erode public confidence and damage national security efforts.
“We want people to know that if you are helping the police force, then you are helping Nigeria. Whatever you put out should be based on facts,” he said.
He also insisted that the police were not shielding officers found guilty of misconduct.
“We want people to ensure that before you move a video to another person, verify if they are true or not. There are quite a number which are rampant but happened 5 to 6years ago but we are not sweeping anything under the carpet”, he added.
