- Suspects in the Tohouo’s Ikoyi residence robbery deserve their day in court
Although the attack on the Managing Director of Maersk, Gildas Tohouo, early this month in their Ikoyi, Lagos residence was an isolated incident, it was a nightmare, all the same, especially for expatriates in the state.
During the incident, masterminded by the couple’s electrician-cum- maintenance man who had brought an accomplice into the premises for the operation, Tohouo’s wife, Bernadette, was killed.
According to reports, the suspects made her transfer some money into their account, collected her ATM card, stabbed and then forced her to drink acid before suffocating her with a pillow.
Tohouo who had been separated from his wife as soon as the suspects entered, was also stabbed and forced to drink acid.
But he managed to get a distress alert to his chief security officer who contacted police commissioner Hakeem Odumosu. Their three children were however unhurt.
Maersk is a Danish conglomerate with activities in the transport, logistics and energy sectors across the globe. Tohouo is a Cameroonian while his wife was said to be from Hungary.
A neighbourhood source said “Their electrician came with his friend. They locked husband and wife in different rooms, forced the wife to transfer some money to them and also collected her ATM card.
They equally forced them to drink acid.
“A team led by the CP arrived at the scene and surrounded the premises while the suspects were still there. They were both apprehended.”
That the state commissioner of police personally led the operation to the couple’s residence underscored the importance attached to the incident.
And, like the proverbial fly that would follow dead bodies to the grave, the suspects, Olamide Goke and Ade Akanbi, not satisfied with all they had been able to get from the house, still waited long enough for the police to catch up with them at the scene of crime.
Police spokesman Bala Elkana, who confirmed the incident added that the case has been transferred to homicide unit, State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (SCIID), Panti.
The attack was indeed daring given the huge investment the Lagos State government has made in its efforts to secure Lagosians through the state security trust fund.
Banks, companies and other private businesses in the state contribute substantially into the fund because it is when the state is secure that their own businesses too can flourish.
Indeed, the fund has achieved a reasonable measure of success and has indeed become a model that other state governments have emulated.
The attack is a wake-up call on the elite who make use of domestic workers in their homes to be more vigilant. The services of such artisans would definitely be required at one time or the other.
But there is the need for serious background checks before such persons are allowed into their premises. There is no doubt that the intruders who raided the Tohouos would have found it difficult to penetrate without the active connivance of the electrician who has been well known in the house.
We commend the Lagos State Police Command for promptly arresting the suspects at the scene of crime. The command should intensify its patrols in the state, especially at this Yuletide season.
This is a time when crime rate rises due to activities of criminals who are either jobless or are desperate to make money by any means, fair or foul.
We expect the police to thoroughly investigate the matter to determine the motive for the attack, after which they should arraign the suspects in court.
Insecurity generally is a disincentive to investment. But attacks on such high profile persons, especially when they are foreigners, have more serious implications for investments that Lagos is in dire need of to take care of the teeming jobless youths who throng the state daily in search of jobs.
