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No fewer thank 20 armed robbers, on Sunday, invaded Alaafia Estate at Orogun area of Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, dispossessing residents of their money and other valuables.
It was gathered that the robbers used Point of Sale (POS) machines to transfer money from the accounts of some residents, who did not have cash.
The robbery were said to have collected the Personal Identification Numbers (PIN) and went away with the ATM cards of some when they could not transfer money from their victims’ accounts due to network failure.
The robbers, it was gathered, had earlier stormed the estate about two weeks ago when they robbed a Superintendent of Police and three flats, before Sunday’s operation, which was said to have lasted from 11pm on Sunday to about 2am on Monday.
It was learnt that 25 families were robbed during the Sunday’s attack.
The armed robbers reportedly destroyed properties at No 25, where they accused some of the occupants of peeping to see the way they operated during their previous visit to the estate.
The Police was eventually alerted and the arrival of some armed policemen stopped the robbery, as the robbers took to their heels.
The spokesperson for Oyo State Police Command, Mr Adewale Osifeso, who confirmed the incident, said the police received a distress call around 3am and deployed some of its men to the scene.
“On sighting the policemen, the hoodlums fled the scene after they were thoroughly resisted. In the process, a pistol was recovered along with three cutlasses and a bag containing both male undergarments and SIM cards,” he said.
Osifeso added that efforts were on to apprehend the robbers.