The Adamawa State Police Command has launched investigation into a reported case of a serving Deputy Commissioner of Police who allegedly threatened the life of a neighbour for buying a property near his own as he does not want to live with an Igbo man near his residence.
Last week, the Social Media was awash with the report that certain DCP, a Northerner, who has a house in the Adamawa State capital, Yola, rejected the buyer of a house beside his own because the new neighbour is an Igbo man from the Southern part of the country.
In response to the development, the Adamawa State Commissioner of Police, CP Mohammed Ahmed Barde, has ordered investigations.
,According to a statement from the State Police Command on Saturday evening, “the CP has directed the Deputy Commissioner of Police in charge of Criminal Investigation Department to ascertain the veracity of the allegations for further necessary action.”
Though the statement by the State Police Public Relations Officer, Suleiman Nguroje, did not name the officer in question, but earlier stories fingered one Deputy Commissioner of Police Ibrahim Babazango, who owns a house at a commercial district in the heart of Yola, Jimeta, and who threatened violent attacks against the new buyer of a house beside his own house, Vincent Umeh.
The Police officer, who hailed from Adamawa State, had allegedly said he did not want a Igbo Southerner as his next-door neighbour.
DCP Ibrahim Babazango, currently attached to Lagos State Police Command, was reportedly infuriated to learn that someone from the South East had become his neighbour.
Vincent Umeh, who is Director of a private business empire named Vikings Limited, bought the house in question, located at 33, Mohammed Mustapha Way, part of Yola’s Central Business District, previously belonging to one Ismail Mamman.
Babazango was said to have warned Umeh to reverse the purchase deal or face bitter consequences, including risk to his personal safety.
“We’re a homogeneous community, I don’t want you; you can’t be my next door neighbour, I swear. What sort of insult is this? Can any northerner move now to the South-East, say Onitsha and just bump into any neighborhood to buy a property; just like that?” the DCP reportedly queried in an audio recording.
Narrating his ordeal, Vincent Umeh had told a news medium, “I acquired the property late last year from one Ismail Mamman. I was surprised to receive a call from a man who introduced himself as DCP Ibrahim Babazango, a neighbour of Ismail Mamman who sold the property to me. He threatened that I should abandon the property because he could not guarantee my safety as his neighbour. Given his threat, I reported the matter to the police.”
It was further gathered that Babazango was angry that his former neighbour sold the property to Umeh without offering him (Babazango) the first right to buy.
On his part, the former owner of the house in view, Ismail Mamman, said, “The property is mine and I sold it to Mr. Vincent Umeh. I had approached my former neighbour, DCP Ibrahim Babazango, that I wanted to sell my property. He said he would contact his brother but I didn’t get his feedback; so I sold it to a ready buyer. I have no problems with the buyer at all.”
