By Rick Gladstone and Megan Specia

Tens of thousands of Nigerians have been demonstrating for weeks against a notoriously brutal and corrupt police agency, the Special Anti-Robbery Squad — a show of popular anger, fueled by longstanding grievances over corruption and lack of accountability, that posed the biggest challenge to the government in years.

The demonstrations took a deadly turn this week, as soldiers fired on crowds of protesters, inflaming Nigerians who were already concerned about police use of violence against the demonstrators.

Here are the basics of what is behind the protests and what they could mean for Nigeria, which at 206 million people is Africa’s most populous nation, its largest oil producer and an epicenter of the continent’s economic, political and cultural trends.

What is SARS?

Commonly known as SARS, the Special Anti-Robbery Squad was created in 1984 in response to an epidemic of violent crime including robberies, carjackings and kidnappings. While it was credited with having reduced brazen lawlessness in its initial years, the police unit was later accused of evolving into the same problem it had been designed to stop: a criminal enterprise that acts with impunity.

In June, Amnesty International issued a report that it said had documented at least 82 cases of torture, ill-treatment and extrajudicial executions by SARS officers between January 2017 and May 2020. The victims, Amnesty said, were predominantly men aged 18 to 25, from low-income backgrounds and vulnerable groups. The Nigerian government’s failure to address this problem, Amnesty said, showed “an absolute disregard for international human rights laws and standards.” Read more via New York Times