The Federal Capital Territory Police Command has announced a clampdown on vehicles with tinted windows and covered number plates as part of efforts to curb rising criminal activities such as kidnapping.
In a statement posted on X.com late Tuesday, the command’s spokesperson, SP Josephine Adeh, warned vehicle owners in the FCT to remove any tinted glass from their vehicles or face the risk of having their cars impounded.
She wrote, “For now, the use of tinted glasses on vehicles is prohibited.
“If your vehicle has tinted glasses, kindly remove them to avoid having your vehicle impounded by the police.
“This is one of the measures implemented to combat the rising incidents of ‘one chance’ and other criminal activities in the FCT.”
The FCT Commissioner of Police, Olatunji Disu, also reiterated this directive during a parade of suspects on Tuesday.
In a video posted alongside the statement, Disu said many of the victims rescued from kidnappers had cited the use of tinted windows as a factor that made it difficult for people to identify them as being in distress and explained that criminals often took advantage of vehicles with covered numbered plates to carry out their operations without being traced.
He said, “We are clamping down on all commercial vehicles and everybody tinting their vehicles. We need to see people in their vehicles; tinted glass is contributing to a lot of lawlessness.
“A lot of the kidnapped victims that we have rescued have given us their word that the tinted glass made it impossible for people to know that they were in distress.
“A lot of them at the same time covered their number plates, or some deliberately did not put number plates on their vehicle.”
The CP issued a stern warning to residents, stating that the enforcement of the ban on tinted windows, covered number plates, and unregistered vehicles would be vigorously carried out moving forward.
“This is to warn residents of the FCT that henceforth the police will enforce all laws on tinted glasses. Nobody has the right to tint their vehicles. We will enforce the law on covering number plates; nobody has the right to cover their number plates.
“We will enforce laws on people not fixing registration numbers on their vehicles, because all these are forms of criminality that people take advantage of to rob innocent citizens of the FCT,” he added.
