Car thieves on the prowl at Alausa

STRANGE things are now happening at the Lagos State Government Secretariat, Alausa, Ikeja. Vehicle owners are telling bitter tales as they are no longer safe at the hands of daylight thieves who have made the parking lot near the second gate their new area of operation.

Ordinarily, any car owner who has anything to do at the secretariat should rest assured that cars parked at the said space are safe. Even the presence of security men at the gate nearby has not deterred these evil doers.

Since January, a lot of shocking incidents have taken place there. For instance, a Toyota Camry car was reportedly stolen from the parking lot. The incident happened in broad daylight in February. Also in the daytime, about three weeks ago, the criminal elements went for another car, a Toyota Corolla belonging to a woman. They disconnected the car’s brain box and went away with it. Another Toyota Camry was said to have suffered the same fate, losing its brain box to the yet unidentified thieves.

Not done, a report said that a vehicle owner who kept the sum of N900,000 in his car returned to discover that his car had been vandalised; his money was gone.

Just on Wednesday, a Lexus SUV that was parked at the spot was vandalised with the two chromes on the bumper removed.

The owner, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said it was the second time that he would lose the chromes to vandals at the same park. The first incident, he said, took place in January. He explained that the first incident caused him to be parking the SUV in a space that is not secluded so that vandals would think twice before trying anything. He was wrong.

But what exactly are the authorities doing? For instance, at the secretariat, there are no CCTV cameras. It is a place where motorists would enter without being screened.