The Nigeria Police Force has explained that the sounds heard during the #FreeNnamdiKanu protest might have been mistaken for gunfire, clarifying that only tear gas canisters were used to disperse the crowd.
Force Public Relations Officer, Benjamin Hundeyin, made this known on Monday, the 20th of October, while speaking on Channels Television’s Politics Today programme.
His comments followed claims by activist Omoyele Sowore that officers fired live bullets at protesters demanding the release of the detained IPOB leader, Nnamdi Kanu.
Hundeyin refuted the allegation, stressing that no live rounds were used and that the operation ended without any injuries.
He said: “Now talking about live ammunition, I can say, I can state it categorically, authoritatively, that no live ammunition was fired today. Not a single live ammunition.
It’s very easy for people who are not familiar with the sounds to mistake the firing of tear gas for live ammunition. It makes the same popping sound, the explosion-like sound, but I can say it on good authority that no live ammunition was fired.
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He added: “Well, if you talk about tear gas canisters being picked on the floor, yes, I would agree, but I’m yet to see. But I’m also confirming again that there was no live ammunition fired at the protesters.
We gave enough warning for those people to step back and not go beyond where they were. But they were adamant, and they were going to approach these areas, and we just conformed to standard operating procedures.
Our SOP is to use minimal force that is commensurate with the resistance we are getting. And we used tear gas. That was the least that we could do. Nobody was harmed or injured, and we were able to successfully achieve our mandate and disperse the protesters.”