Reality TV star Adekunle Olopade has shared a deeply unsettling account of his encounter with police officers in Lagos.
Describing how a late-night drive turned into what he called ‘a near-kidnapping experience’ in the hands of men who were supposed to uphold the law.
Taking to social media, Adekunle narrated that the incident occurred in the early hours of the morning after he decided to take a drive to clear his head.
According to him, he was stopped at a police checkpoint near the VGC roundabout around 1 a.m. while driving his mother’s car, a vehicle he had swapped with her earlier in the week.
What began as a routine stop quickly escalated. The officers searched the car thoroughly, found nothing incriminating, yet became increasingly suspicious when they discovered that the car’s documents bore a different name.
Despite his explanations, the officers accused him of stealing the vehicle.
He recounted that a senior officer at the scene ordered the car to be seized, and when he refused to hand over the keys, the officers forcibly restrained him.
Adekunle said he was handcuffed, strangled, and stripped of his phone during the altercation, before he was then transported against his will from VGC to Area J Command, Elemero, Ibeju-Lekki.
At the station, Adekunle said he was interrogated, accused of being a cultist, and asked to undress so officers could look for tattoos.
When nothing incriminating was found, they searched his phone and found nothing incriminating to, then they demanded that he ‘do something’ for them, a request for a bribe.
Eventually, he was asked to withdraw money from a nearby POS before being released at around 6 a.m. Only after this was done was he given the car documents, his phone, and then some advice.
Adekunle’s detailed account has drawn outrage online, with many Nigerians condemning the persistent issue of police extortion, harassment, and brutality in the country despite repeated promises of reform.
He concluded by saying, “I didn’t think Nigeria would happen to me this soon… What if I lost my cool, and they ended my life? No one would know. The truth of what happened would never see the light of day.”
