A trigger-happy policeman attached to the Nigerian Petroleum Development Company, NPDC, Benin, Edo State, has shot a 400-level student of the University of Benin, Juliana Martins.

Juliana Martins, of the Department of Mass Communications, and a participant of an ongoing workshop of the Petroleum Industrial Act (PIA), an event organised by the NPDC, was reportedly shot on her leg by the police officer.

Martins, was said to have joined some other students at the gate of the NPDC to demand unpaid allowances for a seminar when she was shot in the leg.

A spokesperson for the Niger Delta Students Union Government, Emieye Romeo, explained that some of the students participated in a workshop on the Petroleum Industrial Act organised by the NPDC.

The management of the firm was said to have refused to fulfil agreements reached with participants of the workshop.

The participants were reportedly supposed to get transport fares and cash incentives, in addition to packs with laptops.

Romeo, who was the coordinator of the workshop, said the students on Wednesday protested in front of the gate of the company over the issues and were asked to return the following day.

Emieye said, “We were disappointed by the organisation’s inability to live up to its responsibility and so we decided to take our protest to the gate of the company.

“While we were still at the gate demonstrating peacefully, a police officer identified as Emmanuel, who was attached to the company, started shooting sporadically, despite warnings from his superior not to do so.

“In the process, a 400-level student of the University of Benin was hit in her leg and was subsequently taken to a hospital for medical attention.”

He called on the state Commissioner of Police, Philip Ogbadu, to sanction the said policeman to serve as a deterrent to others.

The state Police Public Relations Officer, SP Bello Kontong, said he had yet to be briefed about the case. He promised to get back to our correspondent later.