Ondo State Police command has denied the arrest of suspected killers of Mrs. Funke Olakunrin, the daughter of the leader of Afenifere, Pa Reuben Fasoranti.
Their statement has disagreed with the claim of the National Publicity Secretary of the pan-Yoruba socio-cultural organisation, Afenifere, Mr. Yinka Odumakin, that four suspects including Mrs. Olakunrin’s driver had been arrested in connection with the murder.
But, the Afenifere spokesperson, Mr Yinka Odumakin, has insisted that the Special Anti Robbery Squad (SARS) arrested the killers of Mrs. Funke Olakunrin.
Recall that Mrs. Olakunrin, the daughter of the leader of the Afenifere, Chief Reuben Fasoranti, was shot dead by bandits on the Ore-Sagamu Expressway in July 2019.
Mr. Odumakin issued a statement on Monday where he revealed that four of the suspected killers had been arrested by the police.
Dismissing the Ondo State Police denial, Mr. Odumakin said in another statement he issued on Tuesday that the SARS operatives themselves informed the Afenifere leader of the arrest on Saturday.
He urged the people of Nigeria to disregard the command’s statement on the matter and blamed it for its inability to unravel the killers of the woman nine months after.
Mr. Odumakin stated:
“Kindly disregard the statement credited to the Ondo Police PRO on the above subject,” he said.
“The regular police in Ondo State have behaved so irresponsibly on the murder of Mrs Funke Olakunrin in the last nine months and this breakthrough could never have been theirs.
“But for the SARS that has now apprehended the suspected killers, we would have lost confidence in the organisation.
“We were shocked that the regular police in Ondo released the car in which Mrs Olakunrin was killed to the family the day after the incident without any forensic (examination).
“It was after Afenifere’s complaint to the police at the highest level that they came to take the car for forensic (analysis) after seven days of people touching the car with no report to the family till date.
“They just asked the family to come and take the car that they were done with it. They were not going to do any autopsy on her until we insisted that one must be carried out. They never deemed it necessary to brief the family even once in the last nine months.
“But the SARS, who arrested the suspected killers, formally briefed Papa Fasoranti last Saturday, showing the responsible face of the police.
“The 94-year-old Pa Fasoranti, who had been having sleepless nights in the last nine months, has resumed normal sleep since the SARS briefed him on the arrest.
“The driver, who was at the wheel when Mrs. Olakunrin was killed and went with the killers, was treated with kid gloves by the regular police in Ondo, but the SARS took him in yesterday (Monday) after he failed to report for days despite repeated invitations.”
Odumakin commended the SARS for the arrest of the alleged killers, adding, “We wait for a thorough investigation that will lead to diligent prosecution.”
Responding to Mr. Odumakin’s statement, Ondo State PPRO, Mr Leo-Ikoro said, “the Afenifere spokesperson misunderstood the mission of the SARS personnel who visited the Afenifere leader.
“The visit of the SARS operative was to seek the permission of the Afenifere leader to allow his driver to come and identify some persons arrested to see if they were the suspects in question.
“That does not mean the suspects who murdered his daughter had been arrested,” said Mr Leo-Ikoro.
“We are investigating that case like you know, the SARS here and the federal SARS, both of them are working.
“Now the federal SARS came with some alleged suspects in that case; they needed identification, and you know that the driver of that late woman stays with the chief.
“What they did was to go there to see whether chief could allow them have that driver to identify those people, that was all.
“They have not arrested these people and say they are the ones who did that, it was to see whether the driver could identify any of them as being one of those who took part in that incident.”
“I have spoken to Yinka himself and I told him what happened and I also spoke to the SARS Commander in Ondo and he told me exactly what happened,”
“There is no way they will make any arrest and the Commissioner of Police here will not know and there is no way we will make any arrest and the Inspector-General of Police will not know.
“We will be happy to make the arrest, but this one is not correct and there is nothing to hide.”