ikeja area of Lagos was, Wednesday, thrown into panic following report of the discovery of substance suspected to a bomb, in one of the offices in Ikeja Local Government.
Staff and those who came for different transactions, rushed out of the building with some car owners abandoning their vehicles as they fled for dear life.
A multiple auto crash was also averted as motorists including commercial motorcyclists plying the route hurriedly made u-turn.
Traders were not left out as some of them managed to lock up their shops and vacated the area.
Report said the combustive substance was planted and connected to an air conditioner behind the councils’ doctor’s office. It was reportedly discovered by one of the staff who was at the verge of putting on the air conditioner.
Unconfirmed reports said bomb experts who arrived the scene later stated that the substance would have exploded if the air conditioner was put on.
The Lagos State Commissioner of Police, Mr Yakubu Alkali, who was having a security meeting with his senior officers at the time of the incident, reportedly drafted some policemen to the scene.
Policemen from the Bomb Disposal Unit who promptly arrived the local government, directed that all vehicles be removed from the premises as they went about their search for the combustive substance which they later discovered.
The Council Secretary who gave his name as Hon. Ayodele told Vanguard that the policemen from bomb squad promised to take the substance to the laboratory to ascertain whether it was an explosive or not.
The Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, Mr Samuel Jinadu, who was also at the scene, told journalists that the substance was not an explosive . But he did not state what exactly it was.
Jinadu disclosed that prior to the bomb scare, policemen from Bomb Disposal Unit had gone on awareness campaign on bombs round many institutions in the state.
However, despite assurances by the police that the substance was not bomb, none of the local government staff dared to go inside as they all stayed out of the area for fear of another explosive material. As at the time of going to press, story of the bomb scare had spread all over the city heightening earlier fears that the dreaded Boko Haram group may have finally focused attention in Lagos.
It would be recalled that in the past weeks, rumors of threats by the group to bomb the Third Mainland Bridge in Lagos has been on the air with security agents assuring that there was no truth in it
