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Who killed Esi Oluwo at a political rally?

By Eniola Daniel
28 April 2015   |   12:25 am
Although the much talked about elections in the country have come and gone and winners and their supporters are rejoicing while the losers are rueful, the family of Olayemi Eniola, popularly called Esi Oluwo is in a mournful mood occasioned by the painful murder of one of their own.
Late Olayemi Eniola aka Esi Oluwo

Late Olayemi Eniola aka Esi Oluwo

Although the much talked about elections in the country have come and gone and winners and their supporters are rejoicing while the losers are rueful, the family of Olayemi Eniola, popularly called Esi Oluwo is in a mournful mood occasioned by the painful murder of one of their own.

In fact, they are in shock over death of their son, who was murdered by a gang allegedly sympathetic to the All Progressives Congress (APC)’s stalwart and a leader of the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW), Musiliu Akinsanya aka MC Oluomo on April 9, 2015.

Eniola, aged 45, who was a strong member of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Oshodi, before decamping to the APC shortly before the April 11 elections.

According to his Personal Assistant, Ikechukwu Jeff, few days before Eniola’s gruesome murder, he was said to have received a phone call from an undisclosed APC chieftain inviting him to the home of a national leader in Ikoyi for a peace meeting. The meeting was said to be cenntred on the way forward for Oshodi after a dismay performance of APC in the Oshodi-Isolo constituency during the March 28 presidential and National Assembly elections.

In a chat with The Guardian, Jeff recounted the incidents that led to the death of his boss thus:

“I followed my boss to meet Bola Tinubu for an emergency meeting on how to help the APC win Oshodi because my boss was a member of the defunct Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) before he joined the PDP.

“After the meeting with the APC leaders, my boss came back to Oshodi to rally with the APC ahead of the governorship and House of Assembly elections of April 11. He urged his supporters to vote for APC candidates.

“On April 9, two days before the election, there was a rally in Oshodi. We attended and we were warmly welcomed into the party by the leaders in the area. This, however, did not go down well with some leaders, who felt threatened by the entry of Esi Oluwo into their fold.

“During the rally, some of us were threatened by some boys loyal to the NURTW leader. Soon after that, a fight broke out at the venue and all the decampees from the PDP, including my boss, were chased away. My boss was shot but the bullet didn’t penetrate him. We were pursued from Oshodi to Ajao Estate bus-stop, where he (my boss) was cornered and beaten to a state of unconsciousness.”

An APC agent in the area, Oladipupo Sulaimon, however, debunked Ikechukwu’s claims, saying it was not APC members that attacked the decampees but PDP members in Mafoluku attacked the APC during the rally.

Sulaimon said: “Mafoluku has been at loggerheads with Oshodi politically for a very long time. The deceased is known for making trouble in the area. It was his gang that attacked Oluomo and other people during the rally. Oluomo cannot handle a gun. It was his gang that killed him,” Sulaimon noted.

Sadimu Mutiu, Oshodi-Isolo Constituency II House of Representative’s-elect, said he was yet to get the detail about the deceased but that information so far available to him indicated that the deceased was a prominent member of the PDP, who decamped to the APC shortly before the rally.

“The news of his decampment to the APC at the early hours of Thursday came to us as a surprise because he was a formidable grassroots mobiliser and one of our prominent members in PDP. The party felt bad but we could do nothing to make him change his mind as there was no sign of his disloyalty to the party but we felt that he was invited to the fold of the APC for them to kill him.”

The Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO), DSP Kenneth Nwosu, while promising that the police would unravel the killers of Eniola, said: “We are on top of the situation, you know this kind of murder case is not straight forward. So, we need more time to do a thorough investigation but I promise you that the murderers cannot escape punishment.”

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