The Beginning

 The End SARS is a decentralised social movement against police brutality in Nigeria. The slogan calls for an end to the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), a controversial unit of the Nigerian Police Force with a long record of human-rights abuses. The protests started in 2017 as a Twitter campaign using the hashtag #ENDSARS to demand the Nigerian government disband and reform the police unit.[10][11][12] After experiencing a revitalization in October 2020, mass demonstrations were occurring throughout Nigeria in major cities, and the hashtag had 28 million tweets. Nigerians shared stories and video evidence of how members of SARS engaged in kidnapping, murder, theft, rape, torture, unlawful arrests, humiliation, unlawful detention, extrajudicial killings, and extortion in Nigeria. SARS officers have been alleged to profile youths based on fashion choices, mount illegal road blocks and searches, conduct unwarranted temperature checks, arrest without warrant, rape women, and extort young Nigerians for driving nice cars and using iPhones.

The Nigerian president had announced scrapping the police unit (SARS), directed state Governors to constitute a Judicial Panel of Inquiry to decide on cases of killings and brutality by officers of the defunct SARS so punishment can be meted on rogue officers. However, the protesters refused all entreaties to suspend the protests and nominate youth Representatives into the Judicial Panel and called the government's bluff.

Within a few days of renewed protests, some claimed victory as the Nigerian Police Force announced it was dissolving SARS on Sunday, 11 October 2020. However, many noted similar promises had been made in recent years, and that the government planned to reassign and review SARS officers to medical centres rather than remove them entirely. Protests have continued accordingly, and the Nigerian state has maintained a pattern of violent repression, including the killing of demonstrators. There have been international demonstrations in solidarity with those happening in the country, and the scope of the movement has also grown increasingly critical of the Muhammadu Buhari-fronted Nigerian state and society as a whole.[1

Protest camp at Lekki Toll Gate

Protesters had been camping at the Lekki Toll Gate for two weeks prior to the shooting. The protesters prevented vehicular traffic on the major thoroughfare during these two weeks of demonstrations.