With allegedly falsified credentials, the 37-year-old impostor turned medical doctor and practitioner was taken into custody by the Zone 2 Police Command in Onikan, Lagos.
While parading the suspect to reporters in Lagos on Tuesday, Olatoye Durosinmi, the Assistant Inspector-General of Police in charge of the zone, confirmed the arrest.
According to Durosinmi, the suspect—who identified himself as the managing director of the Skylink Medical Center in Ikorodu—was taken into custody by members of the Zonal Anti-Piracy Unit.
“Based on the intelligence gathered by the command through members of the Elepe community concerning the activities of the suspect, a team of detectives, led by SP Mariam Ogunmolasuyi, swung into action,” he said.
“The officers arrested the suspect, conducted a search and recovered two suspected forged certificates of Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State and Medical and Dental Council of Nigeria (MDCN).
“Immovable hospital equipment was also recovered,” he said, noting that the hospital complex had been locked off while an investigation was conducted.
According to Durosinmi, the suspect admitted to producing the certificates electronically because he did not receive a degree from the university or an MDCN certificate. He claims that the suspect’s sole educational background is a West African School Certificate.
According to the police chief, the suspect confessed to having six members in total, two of them were professional nurses and the other four were amateurs. “According to him, he worked as a Nursing Assistant at Fabo Medical Centre in the Majidun area of Lagos before establishing his own hospital,” he said.
The AIG went on to say that during the course of the suspect’s three years of practicing illegal medicine, he successfully performed three surgeries: two Cesarean sections and one appendicitis.
According to him, the current investigation has shown that the suspect did not possess the necessary qualifications to operate the facility.
Durosinmi advised the public to come forward with information to the police anytime they had any suspicions about any illegal activity.
He said that in order to purge the area of such criminal elements, the command was collaborating with the health ministries in Lagos and Ogun States.
Newsmen on the parade’s sidelines were informed by the alleged phony medical practitioner that he had previously performed general surgeries and treatments.
He claimed that prior to opening his hospital, he spent 2.5 years learning the position from someone else. “I am just a secondary school certificate holder but I forged the MBBS certificate,” the suspect said.
