The recent discovery of the body of a youth in a local market in Lagos has sparked outrage over frequent killings and dumping of bodies inside the market. In this maiden report, KUNLE AKINRINADE writes on the criminal gang behind the killings inside the market, the helplessness of security agents and the silence of the market leadership in combating the crime.

A market is a trading centre for commerce where sellers and buyers converge to exchange goods and services for money. But Idera Market defies the meaning. It bustles in the day but stinks with bloodshed and bodies at nightfall. The market stank again on August 3 when the mangled body of a young man everyone knew but were afraid to mention was evacuated by the police from the mashed foodstuff section of the market in the early hours of the day.

Nestled between James Okiki Street and the Old Abeokuta Motor Road in Oko-Oba area of Agege, a Lagos suburb, Idera Market was established in the early 1980s as a foodstuff market. A few years later, it was renamed the New Garage Market, following the relocation of commercial vehicles from the nearby Total Motor Park to its premises. It reverted to its status as a market after the motor park relocated from the market in the early 90s.

However, the landscape of the market has witnessed human bodies as much as it recorded huge volume of commercial transactions lately, with bodies sometimes dumped in open stalls and at times dismembered and packed inside big plastic containers at the second-hand plastic section of the market. No one, including the Iyaloja (female market leader), Mrs. Omobolanle Adebowale, has admitted knowing the exact number of bodies so far discovered in the market.

Adebowale said: “Countless bodies have been discovered in this market long before I became the Iyaloja. Long before I became a market leader, firearms have been uncovered here, yet nothing has been done about it. There have been killings in this market long before my emergence as a market leader.

“Most of the boys responsible for these crimes are youths in this neighbourhood whose fathers are landlords and they are the ones bringing in people from outside to kill frequently.

“The number of bodies has reduced since I became the Iyaloja after I invited the Lagos State Environmental and Special Offences Task Force to this market to rid it of miscreants.’’

Market or slaughter slab?

Inside the sprawling market, an unfriendly environment stares a visitor in the face. From the poultry section, the grocery stalls and the plastic containers stacked and scattered in the open to the foodstuff and fruits sections and the makeshift structures, the market bears tell-tale of environmental and security concerns.

Some sections of the market, particularly the open stalls, have been converted into rooms occupied by miscreants. Other stalls have also been converted into makeshift structures where fiendish gangsters with gory lust reign with supreme power, unchecked. In the last few years, their reign has brought tears to the families of their victims and traders whose goods are used as shields to cover the bodies of their victims

One of the victims was Azees Lawal, whose mangled body was found on August 3. The deceased was a former student of Vetland Secondary Model School at the other side of the Old Abeokuta Motor Road. He was a 32-year-old technician who graduated from the Lagos State Technical College, Agidingbi, Ikeja.

Lawal had previously worked as a technician at the Aluminium Village Market in the Dopemu area of Agege before taking up a job in Idera Market, overseeing the toilet facility there. It was at the market he met the gang that terminated his life in cold blood.

The gang behind killings, dumped bodies

The killings and bodies discovered were not just happenstance; they were allegedly orchestrated by a notorious gang led by one Habeeb a.k.a. Abela. Other members of the gang include Akube, Isu and Abela’s younger brother Nasir. They were said to have beeninitially recruited as environmental watchmen for the market surroundings and adjoining neighbourhoods.

However, the four men led by Abela, who are said to be members of Neo Black Movement (NBM), one of the cult groups notorious for killing members of rival groups and perceived opponents, soon recruited youths in the market into their gang and morphed into a terror gang. Since they berthed at the market, they have been fingered in the killing and dumping of bodies there.

Abela, who is said to hail from a North Central state, was said to have taken Azees like a brother and had a strong rapport with the deceased.

The event leading to Lawal’s death started on a friendly note in the evening of Sunday, August 2 when Lawal attended a birthday party hosted at a Planet J Bar at Gegento area of Oko-Oba, a stone’s throw from the market. At the party, he met Abela and his boys, and they exchanged banter. But a scuffle involving some party guests and revelers at the bar terminated the sweltering gyration at nightfall.

It was during the fight that an iPhone fell from the pockets of one of the youths involved in the fight, and Abela was said to have picked up the phone and handed it over to Lawal to hold for him. When Lawal was spotted with the phone by its owner, he pointed at Abela as the person who gave him the phone, and his claim was said to have angered Abela, who, together with his boys, brutalised Lawal for exposing him as a phone thief.

“Some boys who mingled with the crowd at the party then sparked a fight that lasted a quarter of an hour, and Abela seized the moment to pilfer an iPhone from one of them.

“The music was stopped to fish out the culprit at the birthday party. However, the phone was spotted with Azees (Lawal) at the party. He was subjected to assault and humiliation even as he told everyone around that the phone was given to him by Abela, described as a leader of a local branch of the Neo Black Movement (NBM), a notorious cult group.

“Pained by the humiliation he suffered in the presence of Abela who passed the phone to keep for him without coming to his rescue while he was being beaten and shamed, Azees (Lawal) confronted Abela, described as his big brother, who also felt affronted and pounced on him with other members of his gang,” a source at the party identified as Wole told our reporter.

However, not satisfied with the brutality he had already meted out to Lawal, Abela and his boys at about 3 am on Monday, August 3 took the deceased In a commercial tricycle to Idera Market. At the market, Abela became the accuser, the judge and executor as he supervised the cruel beating of Lawal who was also shot in the leg and arm to prevent him from putting up any resistance or attempting to escape.

“Azeez (Lawal) was shot in the leg and hand by Abela after they moved him to Idera Market popularly called New Garage Market.

“After he was brutalised and shamed in the open, Azeez called out Abela for abandoning him in his trying moments despite being the real culprit. Azeez’s boldness angered Abel and his boys, and they subjected the boy to torture and beating during which he died.

“Abela was trying to intimidate and brutally coerce Azeez (Lawal) to confess to the crime he did not commit when he died. Azeez (Lawal) killed by Abela’s gang was not a cultist.

“The boy was a very innocent youth who took Abela like an older brother and ran errands for him.

“What actually happened is that Abela could not own up to being the real thief after the phone was found with Azeez for fear of being attacked by the phone’s owner, who is the leader of another leading gang in the area.

“Abela, who witnessed how Azeez (Lawal) was assaulted for stealing, denied dispossessing the owner of the phone despite being sighted by the people around.

“Instead, to save himself from trouble, he resorted to openly brutalising Azeez (Lawal) and tried to force him to confess to being the thief and even recorded the torture scene with a phone and shared it with his goons.

“Unfortunately, Azeez (Lawal) gave up the ghost shortly after the beating and before he was taken to Merit Hospital.

“Abela and his NBM boys fled the scene at the market after the boy (Lawal) could no longer move his body or talk again.

“Azeez died in their hands while the crowd of revelers left the lounge where the party was held.

“The video capturing the moment Azeez was begging for his life before he eventually died on Monday August 3 is even on the social media space.”

In the footage sighted by our reporter, the deceased was heard appealing to Abela and his boys to spare his life, saying that he was innocent while he was beaten with bamboo sticks.

“Ah, Egbon (brother) Abela, please, these beatings are unbearable. I have nothing to confess…,” he said.

At a point in the video, one of the boys told the rest of the gang to complete the task of brutalising Lawal, saying: “Let us complete this job quickly.”

At another interval in the footage, a helpless Azeez cried out, saying: “I am weak, I am dying, don’t tie me with a rope.”

The blood-soaked body of the deceased was buried on August 5 at the public cemetery in Jafojo area of Agege. The burial assumed a dramatic twist after one of Abela’s boys who participated in the brutality that led to Lawal’s death, identified as Isu, was spotted at the burial and was promptly arrested by the police and detained.

Other victims

Abela, who is now on the run following the brutal killing of Azeez Lawal, was also linked to the brutal raping and killing of a young lady identified simply as Toun around the Yuletide period in 2025.

Toun, described as a virgin, was said to be returning from a white garment church near the market when she was accosted by Abela. She was abducted and taken to a stall in the market and raped repeatedly by Abela until she became weak.

Thereafter, the lady was killed after she told Abela that she knew him and that he should not have raped her. To cover up, the body of the lady was dismembered and dropped inside big plastic container.

“Abela dumped the body of the lady he raped and killed inside the second-hand plastic container at the market for days until it was discovered after the odour from her decomposing body fouled the plastic section of the market,” a porter at the market, AbdulMajid Barde, said.

“Toun had actually left an evening service at our church and was returning home at nightfall when Abela made passes at her but she declined. He was seized by Abela, raped and killed.

“The aged grandmother of the lady is still battling trauma from the killing of her granddaughter, and she is currently very sick. Yet, Abela and his boys were never prosecuted because of their political connections,” Toun’s friend, Funmilayo said.

”In March this year, the body of a boy identified as Taofeek was found in this market. The boy was abducted by Abela and his boys for belonging to the Eye Confraternity, a rival cult group, and killed inside the market.

“The boy’s body was dumped in a corner of a stall and later removed by law enforcement agents.

“I believe that it is a matter of time; Abela and his boys will be arrested and made to pay for the killings they have carried out inside the market in recent times,” Funmilayo added.

The blame game

The Iyaloja, (market female leader) of Idera Market, Mrs. Omobolanle Adebowale, claimed she had fruitlessly reported the Abela Boys to the police several times; a claim the Divisional Police Officer (DPO) in charge of Abattoir Police Station, Mrs. Augustina Ikeh, described as untrue.

Adebowale said: “When I became the Iyaloja, I tried to rid this market of hoodlums, especially the boys behind these killings, and I started the cleansing without the support of the local council authorities.

“I instigated the arrest of these boys and chased them out of the market and the killings reduced, but I do not know anything about these latest killings.

“The council authorities employed the night guard, and I have asked for his sack when the lady that was raped to death but nothing was done,” she said in a footage.

The DPO, Mrs. Augustina Ikeh lamented her helplessness, saying that Adebowale had not been cooperating with her in the bid to arrest the mastermind of the killings and the bodies found at the market.

Ikeh said: “I am doing my job. I have the instructions of the Area Commander and Police Commissioner to ensure adequate security and contain the insecurity at the market.

“I have been calling and asking Iyaloja (Adebowale) to point out the boys behind this crime from time to time, and that if she refuses to identify them so that we can arrest them, it means she knows about it (the killing).

“That was what I told her.

“We carried out a raid and arrested some suspects. But to my surprise, Iyaloja (Adebowale) said that I should release the suspects.

“But I insisted that I would not release them and that the case is between the suspects and government.’’ (The Nation)