#EndSARS: ‘We were shot, SARS still working’, Lagos protesters insist

There was a large turnout of protesters at the Lekki tollgate on Wednesday leading to gridlock in the area.

The protesters insisted that some of them were shot at the Lekki tollgate on October 20, 2020.

One of the protesters, who showed scars from the injuries that he secured claimed that he saw three young people being shot.

But the Federal Government had denied that soldiers neither shot nor killed protesters.

However, the protester showed our correspondents covering the events some images on his phone.

The protester who identified himself as AK said, “I was shot. They shot us. I saw three young people on the floor. We were shot. Government is lying.”

Another protester lamented that there was no evidence to show that the banned Special Anti-Robbery Squad is no longer operating.

He complained that one year after the #EndSARS protest, youths are still “extorted” and “brutalised” in the country.

“There is still SaRS. They still brutalise us. We are here to tell the police to stop the brutality and extortion,” he said.

Shortly before the police dispersed the protesters with tear gas, another youth said, “Nothing has changed as regards oppression and brutality.”

Nigerian youths held memorial protests in Lagos and Abuja on Wednesday, one year after security forces violently suppressed mass protests against police brutality and bad governance.

Under heavy police watch, dozens of protesters rallied in a procession of cars waving green and white national flags from windows at the Lekki tollgate in Lagos, the site of the crackdown on last year’s #EndSARS demonstrations.

Nigerian singer Falz was among those who rallied in Lagos.

“It is impossible for us not to memorialise our fallen heroes,” Falz wrote. “We will never ever forget.”

“Innocent Nigerian citizens waved flags and sang till they were shot at, injured and killed.”

Police deployed at Lekki allowed the cars to pass through the tollgate as protesters blasted horns and chanted for justice.

Last year’s rallies began over brutality by the SARS police unit but snowballed into protests over bad governance in the largest mass demonstrations in Nigeria’s modern history.