Amnesty International uncovers horrific abuses at Tiger Base in Owerri, where officers vanish children from mothers and torture detainees.
Human rights defenders at Amnesty International unveiled a damning report on 25 February, painting a grim picture of the Tiger Base anti-kidnapping unit in Imo State.
What started as a force to combat kidnappers and robbers has twisted into a hub of terror, where police officers routinely arrest innocent people, subject them to brutal torture, demand hefty bribes, and even make children vanish without a trace.
Survivors shared chilling accounts that bring the horrors to life.
One mother, arrested with her three young daughters aged six, three, and one-and-a-half, watched helplessly as officers snatched the children away.
“I have not seen my children in over two years,” she recounted, her voice breaking with despair.
Officers claimed they sent the girls to an orphanage but provided no details, instead pressuring her to sell land to “pay” for their return.
In another heart-wrenching case, a woman lost her one-year-old son during a prolonged detention; he simply disappeared, with no records or explanations from the police.
But the abuses run deeper. Officers at Tiger Base lock detainees in filthy, overcrowded cells without windows, where beatings become a daily ritual.
They use iron rods, cables, knives, and whips to inflict pain, forcing false confessions from victims tied up and left hanging.
“They took him out. We heard gunshots… he came back into the cell with bullet wounds,” one witness described, highlighting how officers shoot inmates at will.
Women endure flogging, forced labour like carrying sand, and degrading treatment, all while crammed into spaces so tight they struggle to breathe.
Extortion fuels much of this nightmare.
Police target people over petty disputes, such as land rows or family quarrels, hauling them in to squeeze money from relatives.
Families fork out millions of naira for “bail,” often using point-of-sale machines right on the premises.
One survivor explained how her kin paid over ₦30 million, yet she languished in detention for more than two years.
Junior officers flaunt lavish lifestyles, profiling young men as members of groups like IPOB to justify harassment and rake in cash.
Tragically, deaths pile up in these squalid conditions.
Autopsies reveal victims succumb to asphyxiation, pneumonia, or untreated wounds from torture.
In one instance, Okechukwu Ogbedagu died after three months in custody, his neck compressed in a fatal hold.
When families demand justice, officers harass them further, even charging them with murder to cover tracks.
Japhet Njoku, a security guard accused of theft, met a similar end, beaten to death while police stalled court-ordered examinations.
Amnesty’s probe, based on interviews with 23 survivors, relatives, lawyers, and activists from May 2025 to February 2026, exposes how these acts flout Nigeria’s laws and international treaties.
The organisation demands urgent action: an independent investigation into the unit’s commander and officers, prosecutions for the guilty, and reparations for victims.
They urge reforms to enforce time limits on detentions, ban torture outright, and allow oversight by groups like the National Human Rights Commission.
So far, Nigerian authorities have offered little response.
The police acknowledged Amnesty’s findings in a letter and promised an audit, but outcomes remain unclear.
Public outcry grows, with advocates on social media calling for the base’s shutdown and echoing past scandals like the SARS abuses.
As one X user put it, “Tiger Base is a slaughterhouse for politicians. They have the order to kill at will.”
This scandal underscores a broader crisis in Nigeria’s policing, where power too often breeds impunity.
Without swift reforms, more families will shatter under the weight of these hidden atrocities.
