New details have emerged on how operatives of the Nigerian police attached to the Lagos State Task Force, killed a 20-year-old journalist, Pelumi Onifade on Saturday 24 of October and his corpse disposed at the mortuary in Ikorodu general hospital, Ikorodu.
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Onifade who was a 200-level student of the Department of History, Tai Solarin University of Education, Ijagun, Ogun State, was interning with GboahTV, an online television station.
According to information gathered, on Saturday 24 of October, few days after the shooting at Lekki tollgate, the young journalist was said to be covering the attempted break-in by thugs into a warehouse at Abattoir, Oko Oba area of Agege.
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When men of the police arrived at the scene, they engaged the hoodlums in a gun dwell and Onifade was unfortunately hit by a stray bullet. He was subsequently dragged away by the police into their van before leaving the scene. The police injured a number of the hoodlum and arresting some.
“He was shot despite the professional jacket he wore. His colleague even approached the policemen that Onifade was his colleague and showed them his own identity card, a camera and other gadgets. But rather than listening to him, they threatened to shoot him and got him arrested too,” a member of the station’s management told reporters.
The management of the television station quickly moved to the scene and other relevant places, trying to find Onifade. They visited hospitals, police stations, prisons and particularly, the taskforce command located in the Bolade area of Oshodi.
The source said; “A thorough search was conducted from police stations to prisons and all over Lagos State for four days (Saturday, October 24 to Tuesday, 27), after which a ‘Missing Person’ graphic was shared across all social media platforms to aid his search. That same evening of Tuesday October 27, an officer of the task force called, saying he saw the post, and agreed to meet us on Wednesday, October 28, at the state headquarters, Ikeja.
“At the meeting, the officer that led the squad said they arrested five people at abattoir in Agege, but that one person died. He said they already took the corpse to a mortuary in Ikorodu. They scheduled a meeting for Thursday to confirm if his name was on the list of those arrested, and that if not, we would follow them to the mortuary at Ikorodu to confirm. But due to the public holiday on Thursday the appointment was rescheduled for Friday.
”On Friday morning we got to Ikorodu, and behold, it was Pelumi Onifade’s corpse that we saw.”
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