#EndSARS heroine, DJ Switch, arrested in Lagos
By Emma Ogbuehi
#EndSARS heroine and Disc Jockey, Obianuju Catherine Udeh, professionally known as DJ Switch, has reportedly been arrested in Lagos.
Lagos State Police spokesperson, Benjamin Hundeyin confirmed her arrest to BBC News on Thursday.
According to Hundeyin, DJ Switch was arrested for assaulting a police officer without providing details.
DJ Switch became popular in the aftermath of the October 2020 protests by youths against police brutality.
On October 20, 2020, she live-streamed the aftermath of the Lekki massacre. In the video, they attempted to remove a bullet from the leg of a man who was shot, tying a Nigerian flag around his leg.
For her efforts she was declared a persona-non-grata by the Buhari government and hounded into exile.
Shortly after the October 20 killings at the Lekki Tool Gate, DJ Switch said she had continued to receive death threats over her revelation on the shooting of unarmed #EndSARS protesters in Lagos.
She made the disclosure in an interview with GQ, a New York-based magazine.
The gifted entertainer said she was “frightened” amid the threats, adding that she hoped not to die in the process.
“I have already been threatened. Of course, I’m frightened. I can’t even lie about that. I’m scared,” she said.
She also recounted how her friend who works in the intelligence community called to warn her to stay off the streets.
But the Buhari government called her “a fraud and a front for divisive and destructive forces’’ that will be exposed in the fullness of time.
Minister of Information and Culture then, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, while addressing the media on the #EndSARS protest and its aftermath said DJ Switch was one of the purveyors of fake news and disinformation during and after the #EndSARS protest.
He said: “even when she claimed to have authentic evidence of mass killings, surprisingly, instead of presenting whatever evidence she may have to the judicial panel of inquiry into the protest, she chose to escape from the country under the pretext that her life was in danger.
“I ask: in danger from whom? The military has come out to say they never sought after her.
“To the best of our knowledge, the police never declared her wanted.
“Her conduct thus becomes suspect. Who is she fronting for?
“What is her real motive? Who are her sponsors? If she has any evidence of killings, why is she not presenting it to the panel?
“If she was so desperate for asylum in any country, does she have to resort to blatant falsehood to tarnish the image of the country just to achieve her aim?”
But the government was not able to present the so-called evidence to contradict her revelations.
Nigerians are worried that her arrest may have to do with the #EndSARS saga.
DJ Switch emerged as the winner of the first edition of The Glo X Factor in 2013 at the age of 29.
She is the last of eight children, from Udi in Enugu State, and a Geology graduate from the University of Port Harcourt, Rivers State before turning into a professional disc jockey.
Though she started her entertainment career as a disc jockey, she moved on to become a song writer, as well as a musician.
She first earned attention when her group, Da Pulse, emerged as the winner of the 2009 edition of reality music competition, Star Quest.
They further went on to release a hit song titled, So Tey, which featured American rapper Busta Rhymes in the remix.
Her career fully kicked off after she emerged the winner of the maiden and only edition of the Glo X-Factor in 2013.
She was signed into a record deal with Sony Music as part of the prizes for her emergence.
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