Police say there's connection between cultism and dreadlocks, tattoos

The spokesperson of the Lagos State Police Command, Bala Elkana, says authorities have seen a connection between cultism and people that sport dreadlocks and draw tattoos on their bodies.

The operational conduct of the Nigeria Police Force has been put under the spotlight this week after officers killed a young man in Lagos State [Vanguard]


Following the killing of Kolade Johnson, a 36-year-old father of one, this week, attention has been drawn to the indiscriminate manner with which police officers arrest young Nigerians sporting peculiar hairstyles, or tattoos and are tagged cultists.


Johnson was killed by an officer of the Gbagada division of the Lagos State Police Command's Special Anti Cultism Squad (SACS) while the team was attempting to arrest another man because of his dreadlocks in the Mangoro area of Lagos State on Sunday, March 31, 2019.








SACS has grown notorious for indiscriminate raids and arrests in Nigeria's economic capital as officers target mostly young people they suspect of wrongdoing without any concrete evidence.


Despite admitting that it's not enough for officers to arrest people based simply on tattoos or their hairstyles, Elkana told BBC on Tuesday, April 2 that they'll suspect such people more than regular people.


"Because when you arrest cultists, most times when you look at their bodies, you'll see some signs on them," he explained.


He further went on to claim that dreadlocks and tattoos are "strange to our culture".


However, he noted that stronger evidence is needed to suspect and arrest people for cultism

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