OYO, OSUN TO REOPEN BOLA IGE'S MURDER CASE

Osun State Governor Rauf Aregbesola said yesterday that he and his Oyo State counterpart, Senator Abiola Ajimobi, are ready to re-open the murder case of Chief Bola Ige (SAN), 10 years after his murder.

Ige, former Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, was killed in his bedroom at his Bodija, Ibadan residence on December 23, 2001.
Aregbesola said he had held series of meetings with Ajimobi on how to re-open the case within the next 12 months.
The governor made the disclosure at Premier Hotel, Ibadan, venue of a lecture entitled: “Political violence and assassinations: Implications for the future of democracy in Nigeria”, organized in commemoration of the 10th anniversary of Ige’s assassination.

According to him, the fact that the Federal Government was yet to bring the killers to justice, 10 years after, was a clear indication of lack of political will and alleged incompetence of the law enforcement agents, saying “they know clearly where the case will end”.

Ige’s murder, he said, has evidently put South-West in disarray, until the likes of Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, Chief Bisi Akande, Alhaji Lam Adesina ensured that the late politician did not die in vain. By killing the man, they have created more radicals who carried the spirit of Ige,” he declared.

Aregbesola said that the South-West leader’s killing was presumably masterminded with the aim of capturing the zone, known for its strong opposition to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), adding that late the Ige had secretly resigned from the federal cabinet with the intention of preparing the zone for the 2003 general elections.
He lamented that Nigeria never witnessed the spate of violent deaths that occurred during the administration of former President Olusegun Obasanjo, alleging the “Obasanjo administration witnessed an upsurge in politically-motivated killings that were never experienced even during the colonial era”.
Former governor of Oyo State and the leader of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) in Oyo State, Alhaji Lamidi Adesina, in his welcome address, prophesied that the progressives would soon take over the leadership of the country, adding that the party (ACN) has directed all its members in the country not to accept any appointment from the PDP-led government.

Adesina said that government’s inability to unveil the killers of Ige , 10 years after, was “a clear evidence that the murder was a government murder”.
“I may not know the murderer of Bola Ige, but I know that one day, God will reveal the killers and judge them accordingly. With the experience of our late leader, we have resolved that no member of our party from the South-West should accept to serve any government at the centre not formed by our party,” he stated.
In his remark, Oyo State governor, who is the Chief Host, Ajimobi, commended the organizers and urged the gathering to be consoled by the fact that the late Cicero of Esa-Oke lived well, just as he charged them to be conscious of their activities.

Describing the remembrance of the late Ige as something the people should be proud of and crave for something similar when they breath their last, Ajimobi said that he was daily conscious of the transient nature of life and the legacy to leave behind for him to be remembered for.-sun