A political Science lecturer, Dr Udoh Ogbonnaya, has told the Abia State Panel of Inquiry on Police Brutality, Extra-Judicial Killings and Other Related Matters how a police man brutally slapped and assaulted him to the extent of inflicting injury to one of his ear and eyes.
Ogbonnaya made the al-legation while testifying before the panel headed by the retired former Chief Judge of Abia State, Jus-tice Sunday Imo, at Aguiyi Ironsi Conference Centre, Umuahia.
According to him, as he was exiting from the Shop-Rite Complex, Umuahia, on January 26, 2020, the police officer on duty at the complex mistakenly hit his vehicle with his baton.
When he alighted from his car, he was told that the baton was meant for tricycle operator that was disrupting traffic.
As the matter was getting out of control, he advised that more police officers be invited from outside to assist him arrest the situation.
“The moment the invited police men arrived on the scene one of them ac-costed me and mercilessly slapped and assaulted me, seized my clothes as well as charged his gun on me.
When the situation was brought understand control, only the Keke operator was whisked away by the police”, he said.
Because of incessant tingling sounds he was receiving from his ear as a result of the police assault, he went to the Ear, Nose and Throat, ENT, Unit of the Federal Medical Centre, FMC, Umuahia, for treatment.
According to Ogbonnaya, ENT doctors told him that his left ear has issues and on no account should he allow water to enter his ear, adding he urgently needs medical operation or surgery from India hospital, to correct the health challenges.
He told the panel that all efforts to get justice were in vain as his petition to the commissioner of police, Abia State Command on the matter, was not attended to, neither was the suspect identified.
The reliefs, the University don asked the panel to compel the police to pay him N50 million compensation, to enable him take care of his medical bills in India, including travel expenses and accommodation in India.
But the police counsel, Barr Augustine Udo, in his submission told the panel that the person who assaulted the complainant was not a police man.
The matter is adjourned to March 9, 2021, for adoption of written addresses from both counsels.
