Ogun: Yet Another Murder

Dipo Dina

The assassination of Dipo Dina, a frontline politician in Ogun State, raises the bar on alleged political killings in the rocky state
By Bayo Bernard
The man who sits atop the Hilltop Government House, Oke-Mosan, Abeokuta, Ogun State must be having sleepless nights due to recent developments in his domain which prides itself as the Gateway State. Indeed, for Otunba Olugbenga Justus Daniel, who some say has transformed the state economically, presiding over the turbulent state may have become quite a nightmare. In 2007, the state which shares a border with Nigeria’s economic capital, Lagos was ranked among four other states where fierce political battles have become the order of the day. Based on the cases reported to the Police that year, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) joined Ogun with states such as Imo, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Rivers and Cross River as places where political violence is most prevalent.
The ranking, as it were, is supposed to give Otunba Daniel, a professed Baptist and one-time Secretary-General of the Scripture Union (SU), during his undergraduate years, cause to worry, especially judging from the fact that his over six -year administration as the chief executive officer of Ogun State has witnessed, perhaps, more political violence than any previous administrations in the state.
Yet, it doesn’t appear as though the political turmoil which has earned the state a notorious appendage of “ Gateway of Violence,” alongside the factionalisation of the People’s Democractic Party (PDP), the party upon which Otunba Daniel rode to power, has constituted for the governor a migraine of sorts. Sources also say that the engineer by training is not perturbed by allegations that he has turned the state’s treasury to his cash cow. All these allegations are seemingly the least worries of Governor Daniel, who in the early days of his administration, in 2006, said his goal was “Awakening the Sleeping Giant.”
The issue that has become a nightmare for the governor is how to clear his name and that of his administration from alleged political killings and near assassinations that have taken place in the once peaceful state since he assumed duty as the state’s Chief Security Officer (CSO) in 2003
Though Governor Daniel, as it is, has not been directly linked to the death of some political opponents, keen political watchers point to one old Yoruba adage that says a witch who cried the previous night might as well take the blame for the child who dies the morning after.
The very busy Sango Ota, a business area of the state, suddenly became quiet last Monday, January 25, when news broke that Dipo Dina governorship candidate of the Action Congress (AC) in the 2007 election in the state has been gunned down by yet-to-be- identified gunmen.
Dina, popular among politicians in Abeokuta, the state’s capital as “D-Direct” had earned himself plaudits for being Governor Daniel’s major political critic in the state. The late politician had earlier contested and lost for a seat in the House of Repressntatives under the platform of the Alliance for Democracy (AD).
According to eye-witness accounts, the late politician, well- known for his philanthropism was trailed by the unidentified assassins to the industrial town, where they finally snuffed life out of him. The assailants were said to have killed the Ijebu-born politician after they alleged fired gunshots through the wind shield of his Sport Utility Vehicle (SUV).
Instructively, the late politician has been locked in a fierce political battle with the state Governor. Informed sources say that Dina may have been a victim of the power succession battle in the state, which apparently has transformed the rocky state into a graveyard, for perceived political opponents.
Lately, the state has become a no-go area for some politicians and other prominent citizens, who knowingly or ignorantly had put themselves in harms’ way, after what a prominent politician in the state described as “ challenging Governor Daniel to a political duel.”
Although no one can directly link the governor with these murders, the opposition in the state insist that most of the cases are politically- motivated. While few politicians paid the ultimate price, others were lucky to escape the bullets of assasins. Yet, some political opponents openly allege that Governor Daniel operates what they described as ‘killer squad” as a weapon to silence political enemies.
Few weeks ago, a top civil servant and frontline accountant working with the state government, Zacheaus Kuye, was killed at his Onikolobo home, some hours after he participated in a radio interview where he strongly criticised Governor Daniel’s administration. During the programme, Kuye had lamented the government’s failure to remit cooperative and pension deductions of its workers to the relevant agencies.
Kuye’s ugly end happened barely few months after Mrs. Alaba Lawson, the Iyalode of Yorubaland, escaped death from alleged assasins bullets. Though the prominent businesswoman and politician escaped death by the whiskers, her guard was not as lucky as the attackers slashed his throat, leaving behind his mangled body. Lawson, who has since taken up residence in neighbouring Lagos State, is allegedly not in the good books of Governor Daniel.
Political opponents in the state say the governor may have devised a systemic way of eliminating those apposed to his administration. One of those who hold this view is Doyin Okupe, former Senior Special Assistant to ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo, who has severally alleged that the killings were state- sponsored.
Kuye’s admonition, political analysts say, may not be totally unfounded. One of his supporters, Alhaji Tele Ogunjobi, chairman of Ijebu North Local Government in January 2008 cheated death, allegedly from killers sponsored by the state government. But his three supporters were not as lucky as they were hacked down by thugs who laid an ambush for them at the PDP state secretariat.
For Ogbeni-Oja Lanre Banjo, National Conscience Party (NCP) gubernatorial candidate in the April 2007 election, it is better to die peacefully in a foreign land, than be cut down by assasins in his native state, Ogun. Since he escaped from thugs, allegedly sent by Governor Daniel to murder him, the Public Accountant has since taken up residence in the United States of America.
Banjo, who now performs offshore criticism of Governor Daniel’s administration contends that the governor rode on the wheels of violence to power, and that his government will bear no other fruits than killings and murders. He compares Daniel to a bad tree that cannot bring forth good fruits. He stated that the fact that the governor has not deemed it fit to call his supporter, who attack perceived opponents to order sends wrong signals.
His words: “Daniel’s government was aware that oppositions within and without PDP were being harassed, (yet) the man neither uttered any word nor engaged in any action to deter harassment, attack or assassination.”
His last encounter with paid killers, allegedly from those in government’s pay cheque before he finally fled for his life, was during the 2007 governorship election in the state.
On that fateful day, according to Banjo, he had embarked on a campaign with his supporters where, according to his account, he had a brush with death.
“The most dangerous attempt, was an attack on our campaign at Ijebu-Ode. A fellow gubernatorial candidate warned me not to go to Ijebu –Ode because of what happened to him a day earlier and I told him that I had to campaign to my people there. On getting to to Lagos garage in Ijebu-Ode at about 12 pm, PDP thugs trooped out with cutlasses, guns, woods, et cetera smoking weeds. They were under the intoxication of the weeds; they were no longer ordinary human beings. If you have seen loafers before, you would see some who were smiling, and in those smiles were ready to kill,” he narrated.
While politicians like Banjo quickly read the signs, and promptly had dialogue with their legs, Dina stayed around to engage the Daniel administration in a hard fight. Dipo Dina Movement (DDM), the political platform established by the slain politician, was perceived as a rival political machinery to the one under the control of the governor. Until his death, the accomplished businessman used DDM as a platform to criticise the administration.
In one of his strongest views against the administration, Otunba, Dina had alleged that Governor Daniel was involved in financial malfeasance. According to an advertorial published in some newspapers, the DDM had demanded that Governor Daniel publish the state’s financial status.
The advertorial read inter alia: “For the umpteenth time, the people of Ogun State are asking the Daniel administration to make audited accounts of the state public. This is in line with the Federal Government position on the issue. The Daniel administration should tow the path of honour, probity, accountability, transparency and respect for the wish of the people by showing them how their monies are spent,” it said.
But Governor Daniel has repeatedly denied any involvement in the alleged assasinations. As a Christian and a devout Baptist, the governor said he has never– and would never-get involved in any action that would result in the death of another man. The allegations are unfounded, he said, because those involved are just out to smear his good name.
In his response to the killing of Dina, Daniel in a statement signed by his Chief Press Secretary (CPS), Adegbenro Adebanjo, described the incident as a heinous crime which must be thoroughly investigated.
Daniel: “I am saddened by the reprehensible and ungodly act. It is a condemnable act and those responsible must be speedily brought to justice by security agencies. This is one case that the Police must do all that is possible to crack.”
Adegbenro, in a chat with The Source, down-played allegations that the state has become a killing field of sorts, contentending that such postulations only exist in the imagination of those that derive pleasure in bringing the governor to disrepute. He said those making the allegations should substantiate their claim, by naming politicians that have been killed since his boss mounted the saddle.
The state police command has however, refuted claims that Dina’s death was politically- motivated. Musa Daura, the state Commissioner of Police(CP), said the deceased may have been a victim of armed robbery attack.
Daura said: “They were coming from Lagos, and on reaching ‘Winners Chapel’ an unknown vehicle having four persons inside double-crossed them and ordered them to come out. They obliged and then were ordered to go back; some obliged.
“The deceased raised his leg to move and there was an argument and for failure to comply, the unkonwn men shot him on the left side of his abdomen.”
However, a security expert, Femi Adedeji, in a chat with The Source said that Dina’s killers may never be found. He explained that the police are not well equipped to crack such high profile crime. He also dismissed the comment of the CP as too hasty.
Apart from opposition politicians, those that have accused Governor Daniel of playing deadly politics include some friends and associates, some of who served in his kitchen cabinet.
The testimony of Wale Adedeyo, Deniel’s ertswhile Chief Press Secretary, in 2008, shortly before he was relieved of his appointment, to the effect that his former boss was after his life somehow raised the bar over Governor Daniel’s alleged sponsor of political assassinations.
Shortly before he was sacked as Governor Daniel’s media aide, the public relations expert had claimed that those involved in the botched attempt on his life on January 10, 2008 were state agents. Adedayo, who had since fled the country to Europe in the wake of the assassination attempt on his life, had at different foras alleged further assassination threats. Adedayo’s case was, perhaps, the most publicised assassination attempt in the Gateway State in recent times.
The former CPS was quickly followed in tow by Waliu Taiwo, a former commissioner in the state. Before he was shown the door as member of the State Executive Council (SEC), Taiwo also stirred the hornet’s nest when he joined the league of those who hold the view that a killer squad is, indeed, operating in the state. A week before he was sacked, Taiwo had at a press conference alleged that Governor Daniel had commissioned a fellow commissioner, Bukola Olopade, and some political thugs, to kill him. Taiwo had called the attention of the public to the alleged murder attempt of October 2009 which he claimed was state- sponsored.
To underscore the view that Olopade was, perhaps, working out a script, Taiwo was sacked few days after he made the allegation.
According to the former commissioner, he would have become a victim that fateful day say for the police that came or his rescue. Fearing for his life, “a distress call was made to then Commissioner for Police, Emmanuel Ayeni, who immediately dispatched a team of mobile policemen to my official quarters. On sighting the approach of the policemen, Olopade and the thugs fled,” he alleged.
Meanwhile, the three-time commissioner under Governor Daniel had earlier lost a cousin to the assassins, whom he said must be brought to book.
To underscore the point that Olopade was indeed working out a script, Taiwo was sacked few days after he made the allegation.
Also, few months after Taiwo allegedly escaped from those trying to kill him, Prince Yemi Adefulu, former Commissioner for Justice and Attorney- General of the state, cheated death when assassins allegedly sent after him failed. The former chief law officer of the state claimed that the incident which occurred at his Ilishan home was the handiwork of the Otunba Daniel government.
The spate of politically-motivated killings in Ogun State appear to have become a norm in the once peaceful state, and in the view of a top PDP politician in the state, who spoke with The Source last week, “Dipo Dina may just be one of those that have been pencilled down for assassination by people who want to silence the voice of the opposition.”