BY LINUS CHIBUIKE
THE family of Ifeanyi Okereke, a vendor shot dead by a Department of State Services operative attached to the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila, has given the Speaker a seven-day ultimatum to pay a N500million compensation to the family or face legal action.
The family’s demand was contained in a letter, dated November 23, 2020, signed by their lawyer, Mike Ozekhome (SAN).
The Speaker had written two separate statements, explaining the circumstances surrounding the incident and also disclosing the officer who perpetrated the act.
He also met on Saturday with the family of the deceased at the Okereke family home in Kwata village, Madalla/Suleja area of Niger State, prior to a meeting with newspaper distributors and vendors in Abuja, promising to take care of the immediate family the vendor left behind.
Recall that the DSS had arrested the operative, identified as Abdullahi Hassan.
The letter written by the family’s lawyer, however, said, “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.”
“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,” it added.
