‘Pay or go to court’ Family of slain newspaper vendor demands N500m compensation from Gbajabiamila

The family of late Ifeanyi Okereke, the newspaper vendor who was killed by a stray bullet fired by a security detail attached to Speaker of the House of Assembly, Femi Gbajabiamila, are demanding N500 million compensation from the speaker.

DSS Officer, Abdullahi Hassan, attached to the speaker, fired a gunshot to disperse newspaper vendors who gathered around the speaker last Thursday, November 19, with one bullet hitting Ifeanyi who died instantly.

In a letter written by their lawyer, Mike Ozekhome (SAN) and dated today November 24, the family of late Ifeanyi asked Gbajabiamila to ensure that Hassan is fully prosecuted. Ozekhome was given the mandate to write the letter by the father of the deceased, Okorie Okereke; and the younger brother to the deceased, Destiny Okereke.

The letter read in part

“Our clients have instructed us to make from your good self, the following modest demands: That you use your good offices to ensure the immediate prosecution of your security aide (Abdullahi Hassan), who went on a frolic of his own, clearly acted outside the purview of his duty and responsibility by shooting to death an innocent, harmless and armless citizen.

That you adequately compensate the Okereke family with a modest sum of N500m only. This monetary demand can never adequately replace or take the place of their son, husband, brother, and breadwinner’s life. But it will at least mitigate the obvious trauma and hardship the premature demise of their irreplaceable breadwinner has placed on them.”

The Okereke family gave the Speaker a seven-day ultimatum to meet their demands otherwise they would take legal action against him

“Take note therefore that it is our clients’ firm instruction that in the event that you fail, refuse and/or neglect to accede to or proffer reasonable compensatory terms to our above modest demands within seven days from the date of this letter, we shall without any further correspondences from us, take appropriate legal steps to enforce our clients’ constitutional rights” the letter stated.

Rtn. Victor Ojelabi

Ojelabi, the publisher of Freelanews, is an award winning and professionally trained mass communicator, who writes ruthlessly about pop culture, religion, politics and entertainment.