2nd July, 2010
A bodyguard of Mr. Dele Alake, the former Commissioner for Information and Strategy in Lagos State, Patrick Friday, 26, has been arraigned before an Ibadan Magistrate’s Court for alleged attempt to murder retired Assistant Inspector-General of Police, Mr. Tunji Alapini.
His plea was not taken and was ordered to be remanded at the Agodi prison, Ibadan till Monday by Magistrate Mustapha Ebeloku because the court has no jurisdiction to entertain the suit.
In the two-count charge preferred against him, the police alleged: “That you, Patrick Friday at Gate area of Ibadan, Oyo State, unlawfully attempted to kill Tunji Alapini by shooting him with a pump action gun.â€
The second charge accused Patrick of being in possession of a gun contrary to Sections 320 and 428 of the Criminal Code, Cap. 38, Vol.11, Laws of Oyo State of Nigeria.
The police gave the number of the gun as 002026, saying that it belongs to Alake.
P.M.NEWS gathered that Mr. Dele Alake was interrogated over the incident yesterday and released afterwards. The state Commissioner of Police, Mr. Bola Bolanta, confirmed this at the headquarters of the state police command, Iyaganku, Ibadan.
The police alleged that the accused was in Alake’s car with registration number NT 963 KJA when he shot at Alapini’s Toyota Landcruiser with registration number TJ 10 AAA. In his statement to the police, Friday said he thought Alapini and other motorists who were following Alake’s convoy were assassins sent to kill his boss.
He said it was later that he realised that one of them was the retired AIG Tunji Alapini.
Alake was reported to be involved in a road rage with some motorists on the Ibadan-Ife road while returning from Ekiti State.
He was allegedly detained by the police at its divisional headquarters in Iyaganku, Ibadan.
However, Alake, in an interview with a national daily denied the alleged brush with road users in Ibadan. He said the allegation against him was not true.
The matter has been adjourned till 5 and 6 July, 2010.
—Gbenro Adesina/Ibadan