Torture, Starvation and Disappearances at Imo Police ‘Tiger Base’, Another Eyewitness Account
Imo State, Nigeria – January 12, 2026
What is unfolding inside the walls of Tiger Base in Owerri is not a police anti-kidnapping operation. It is institutionalised terror dressed in official badge and uniform.
Far too often, governments justify repression with the language of security. But at Tiger Base, security has become a smokescreen for systematic abuse, torture, starvation, disappearance, extortion, arbitrary detention, and worse, with zero accountability and zero justice.
The Evidence Is Too Grave to Ignore
Former detainees recount harrowing experiences of being rounded up without a warrant, held for weeks without court appearance, denied food and clean water, and subjected to conditions unfit for humans.
The latest information to this ordeal were detailed in a petition submitted to the human rights organisation Take It Back (TIB) Movement by a former detainee, Augustine Sixtus Nwaiwu.
In the petition, Nwaiwu states that he was arrested without a warrant, explanation, or formal charge on September 9, 2025, and held for ten days without being brought before a court, as required by Nigerian law.
During his detention, he alleges that officers deliberately denied him food and clean water, subjected him to harsh, overcrowded conditions, and witnessed several fellow detainees collapse and disappear under suspicious circumstances.
“I was denied food and clean drinking water throughout the entire period of detention,” Nwaiwu stated in the petition. He described the cells as “grossly overcrowded, poorly ventilated, and extremely unhygienic,” conditions he says were “unfit for human habitation.”
These aren’t fringe stories, they are documented testimonies of cruel, inhuman treatment.
One of the most troubling assertions in the petition relates to the fate of three detainees who reportedly fainted due to hunger and heat and were then taken away by officers, never to be seen again by other inmates.
The petitioner expressed deep concern that their removal could indicate extrajudicial actions by the unit.
Human rights groups have long criticised Tiger Base for abuses. Independent reports and advocacy organisations have accused the unit of unlawful detention, extortion, torture and other abuses, accusations that authorities have repeatedly denied.
Independent reports suggest over 200 deaths or disappearances connected to the unit’s operations, with officers shielded from accountability, even rewarded with promotions and awards amid widespread outrage.
In response to earlier allegations of abuse at Tiger Base, the Imo State Police Command has rejected them claiming they are unfounded.
A police spokesperson described such reports as “part of a smear campaign” and claiming that there is “no credible evidence” supporting claims of torture or extrajudicial killings at the facility despite the mounting evidence and well known reputation, especially amongst indigenes of Imo State.
Human Rights Defenders Targeted for Speaking Out
Rather than defend human rights, the authorities have responded to scrutiny with intimidation and threats.
Amnesty International has raised alarm over sustained threats against activists and journalists exposing atrocities linked to Tiger Base, warning that exposing these abuses should not place defenders in danger.
This threat environment is particularly chilling: human rights advocates and lawyers have reported credible risks to their safety simply for reporting truth, a clear sign that this is not an isolated phenomenon but a pattern of repression.
A Government Sponsored Culture of Violence
When a state not only tolerates but protects and promotes personnel implicated in killings and torture, it ceases to be an arbiter of justice. It becomes a sponsor of terror.
Across the Southeast, human rights watchdogs have documented a broader climate of arbitrary detention, enforced disappearances, and lethal violence at the hands of state and para-state actors, including Ebube Agu and other units, with little effort by authorities to investigate or provide redress.
If a government can detain civilians without charge, inflict cruel treatment, then release or bury them without due process, it has effectively weaponised the state against its own people.
The Price of Impunity
We have seen the cost of unchecked power before. The #EndSARS movement erupted precisely because Nigerians recognised that when a government kills, tortures, or extorts its own citizens with impunity, the social contract is broken.
Tiger Base is not just another police unit with a few bad apples. It represents a systemic failure of oversight, rule of law, and respect for human dignity, a failure that invites terror, not thwarts it.
A Call to the International Community
The world is watching. Amnesty International, civil society organisations, and rights groups have called for independent investigations, transparent judicial review, and accountability for every act of abuse.
These are not mere bureaucratic niceties. They are the minimum requirements of justice in any society that claims to uphold human rights.
No nation can truly be secure while its people live in fear of the very institutions meant to protect them.
The petition to the Take It Back Movement adds to this mounting scrutiny and public calls for an independent investigation into the conduct of officers at Tiger Base, and for accountability for any violations of constitutional and human rights protections.
Related Articles
IPOB Demands International Inquiry Into Insecurity In South-East Nigeria
