A former officer of the disbanded Special Anti-Robbery squad (SARS), a unit of the Nigerian police force has been denied entry into Canada on the grounds of crimes against humanity.
The former officer, identified as Olushola Popoola, was a member of the defunct unit between 2002 and 2009 but resigned following the death of his father.
A Federal Canadian court in Ottawa, Ontario, avowed the decision of the Immigration Department to deny the former operative access into the country on the grounds that:
“the Nigerian Police Force and the SARS to be precise, have committed crimes against humanity from 2002 to 2015”.
The court under the ruling of Judge Sébastien Grammond, while delivering judgment on Popoola’s case, upheld that by simply handing over suspects to the “criminal investigation department” despite knowing that they “would be subject to human rights violations”; the applicant without necessarily participating directly in the SARS’ crimes had made “a significant contribution” to the unit’s brutality.
His claims were suspended while his case was referred to the Immigration Division [ID] of the Immigration and Refugee Board to resolve of his inadmissibility.
It was gathered that in 2011, Popoola resigned from the Nigeria Police Force and departed for the United States in 2016.
He further navigated from the US to Canada, claiming refugee status.
This shows how vast the news of brutality displayed by the defunct unit has travelled the world.
