Onokpite: Family sues for thorough investigation

The family of Chief Ogbe Onokpite, thecandidate of the Citizens Peoples Party (CPP) in the Delta State 2007 and 2011gubernatorial elections who died of police gunshot wounds on November 26, hasappealed to the Executive Secretary of the National Human Rights Commission tocommence a thorough investigation of the incident in order to bring to justicethe policemen and officers responsible for it.

In a statement signed on behalf of thebereaved family by Festus Keyamo, the Onokpite family called for an urgentCoroners’ Inquest towards obtaining “the autopsy report and a full CriminalInvestigation Report of the murder of an innocent citizen.”

It would be recalled that a police report ofthe incident claimed that the late governorship candidate was in the process ofpurchasing arms in the hotel in which he was arrested and shot.
Ibrahim Tsafe, the Delta State Commissioner of Police, said in an interviewthat Chief Onokpite ‘and his accomplices were ambushed by the police detectiveswho were deployed in the hotel from the Area Command of the Nigeria PoliceForce, Warri.”

Chief Onokpite, he said, “was negotiating forarms in the hotel,” and that when he was coming down from the hotel, “we askedhim to surrender but he declined to surrender, instead he confronted the policein company with his men”.

Mr. Tsafe said that a gunfight then eruptedin which Chief Onokpite was fatally injured, and “he died before help could getto him in the hospital”.

On the contrary, the grieving Onokpite and Ighomrore families said inthe statement that when the policemen arrived in Ogbe’s room, “he wasimmediately arrested and brought out (to the open still within the hotelpremises) and shot in the leg.”

According to the statement, Chief Ogbe wasthen taken in a police to the Police Station in Warri “where he was again shotin other more delicate parts of his body and left thereafter to bleed todeath.”

The families said they sent a formalcomplaint to the Inspector-General of Police which was acknowledged by theoffice of the Inspector-General of Police on the 28th of November, but that thecomplaint has been ignored by the Inspector-General of Police despite theirrepeated follow-up through a legal counsel. 
“This goes to show that the Police is protecting the persons behind thecold-blooded murder of Chief Ogbe Onokpite,” the family claimed.  

While he was alive, not many people in DeltaState, except his native Okpe local government, Uvwie and environs, reckonedwith 38-year-old former governorship candidate of the Citizens Popular Party,CPP, Chief Ogbe Onokpite, but, since November 26 when he was shot dead by thepolice at Beeland hotel, Orhuwhorun in Udu Local Government Area, he had grownlarger than life in death.

He was picked up by the police about 6.00 pmon the ill-fated Saturday following the arrest of a suspect, Malick Okorokporo,who confessed that he was instructed by the deceased to deliver two AK 47rifles found on him to one Mr. Collins Egbara. But why he was shot dead andcircumstances that led to the shooting have become a contentious affair.

The Inspector General of Police on December14, sixteen (16) days after solicitor to the family, Festus Keyamo Esq,forwarded , November 28, a strongly worded petition to him on the killing ofChief Onokpite, directed the Commissioner of Police, Delta State,Mamman Tsafe, to investigate the incident. Keyamo rejected the instruction,saying the Commissioner should not be saddled with the responsibility ofinvestigating a matter in which he had already taken side.

It is not known whether the Commissioner hascarried out the instruction of his boss in view of the strong objection, butthe Onokpite family of Ugolo –Okpe, Okpe local government area had sued theInspector General, Commissioner of Police and Area Commander, Warri at a HighCourt in Warri.

Reports say the Delta State Commissioner ofPolice, Tsafe is investigating the death of Onokpite as instructed by his boss.

A senior police officer, however, said thatby going to the court, “The family is asking the Inspector General of Police tostop the investigation, which they called for and the police would have nooption than to wait for the outcome of their court case”.

In a motion on notice filed by J.E. OdoohisiEsq, the family, represented by the eldest man in the Onokpite family, Mr.Lawrence Onokpite, Chief Victor Onokpite and Mr. Diemo Onokpite , urged thecourt to declare that: “The killing of Mr. Ogbe Onokpite by the thirdrespondent’s men on the 26th of November, 2011, through multiple bullet wounds,is a breach of the said Ogbe Onokpite’s fundamental right to life as protectedunder Section 33 of the 1999 Constitution”.

Furthermore, it asked the court to declarethat the killing of Mr. Ogbe Onokpite was done without or in the absence of avalid sentence/order of a court of in respect of a criminal offence andtherefore, illegal, extra-judicial, unconstitutional and without due process.

Another relief sought by the family is anorder by the court for an autopsy examination and/or a Coroner inquest into thecause and circumstances of death of the said Mr. Ogbe Onokpite, which deathoccurred on the 26th day of November, 2011, while he was in police custody.

The family’s grounds for the relief were thatthe deceased was killed in breach of his fundamental right to life by thepolice without any court sentence whatsoever and without due process.

The matter was adjourned to January 6, 2012to enable the police respond to the application by the family.

Meanwhile the official police version ofOnokpite’s death is that: “The suspect (Malick Okorokporo, the mechanic foundwith 2 AK 47 rifles) took the patrol team to Beeland hotel to apprehend hisprincipal (Ogbe Onokpite), who attempted to take to flight on sighting thepolice, but was maimed. The principal gave up the ghost on the way to thehospital”. That is what Mamman Tsafe said in black and white.

On Monday, December 20, few days after theOnokpite family went to court, Malick, who fingered Ogbe Onokpite as the ownerof the guns was charged to a Chief Magistrate Court at Otor-Udu in Udu localgovernment area for conspiracy and unlawful possession of firearms. He wasremanded in prison custody while the case was also adjourned.

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