Nigerians riot after accusations of police torture

A mob, furious because of the death of a man in police custody, formed in a Nigerian town on Sunday. A riot in Dambatta in the Kano state broke out after a man arrested on charges of being a notorious thief died while in custody. Both the family of the man and the mob blamed the police for his death, claiming that he was tortured. Police commissioner Muhammad Tambari Yabo denies the claims.


According to officials, the man stole a motorcycle on Friday night immediately after being released from jail. He was then followed by a mob who badly beat and threw stone at him before being brought in again by police. These injuries, Yabo said, lead to his death.


"Unfortunately one rioter was shot dead and two others injured by stray bullets," said Yabo. "The mob was further enraged and they went about burning some buildings."


The buildings burned by rioters include the police commander's home, a church, and the building used for Nigeria's youth service corps program.


In total, 35 arrests were made. This is not the first incident between police and residence in this area as other episodes of tension have occurred over the last few months.


This news story shows that the violence in Nigeria is common and widely dispersed, and not always related to  Muslim and Christan faiths and the presidential elections. The has long been a tense relationship between authorities and civilians in the country, and these types of riots are not infrequent. If the torture claims are true, it is still difficult to imagine something like this happening in the US, let alone the police intentionally harming civilians. The relationship between authority and civilians is an interesting one in many places of the world, and something I think is important to look at while we study these countries.