Dele Giwa - Investigation, Litigation and Controversy

Investigation, Litigation and Controversy

On 20 October, the day after the bombing, the government convened a press conference presided over by Augustus Aikhomu. Before the press conference started, all press photographers were ordered out, also, foreign journalists and Nigerians that worked for foreign news media were also ordered out. Those left behind were told that the briefing was "off the record" and Aikhomu would not be entertaining any questions.

Aikhomu then went on to ask Ismaila Gwarzo, the Director of the SSS and Haliru Akilu to render their accounts of what had transpired between Dele Giwa and their agencies in the recent past. Gwarzo confirmed that the SSS had invited Giwa for questioning over allegations of gun running. Akilu on his part confirmed that he had called Giwa's home on 18 October to ask for directions to the house so he could stop over to see Giwa while on his way to Kano through Ikeja airport. Akilu also said that he had wanted to visit Giwa at home to "prove a Hausa adage that if you visit someone in his house, you show him you are really a friend.” Ekpu claimed that he remembered Gwarzo saying that the killing was "quite embarrassing" and also that Tony Momoh also described it as "a clear case of assassination", later on he was also quoted as saying "a special probe would serve no useful purpose". Graffiti of the time implied a belief that the SSS had been responsible.

In a newspaper interview years later in retirement, Mr. Chris Omeben who at the time was the Deputy Inspector General of Police (DIG) in charge of the Federal Investigation and Intelligence Bureau (FIIB) at Alagbon, on his part recalled that he was the second officer to have handled the case file after he had taken it over from his predecessor at the FIIB, Mr Victor Pam. Omeben explained that he had done what any competent investigator would have done in unravelling the circumstances surrounding the death of Dele Giwa. He went on to say that he had examined the crime scene and found it suspicious that the toilet adjacent to the blast site which Mr. Kayode Soyinka alleged he was occupying when the explosion occurred had also suffered damage from the blast but Soyinka was left unscathed. Omeben described the force of the explosion to have been strong enough to blow out the steel bars over the toilet window (burglary protection), which in his own assessment made Mr Soyinka's story less convincing. Omeben also claims he requested to interview Dan Agbese, Ray Ekpu and Kayode Soyinka. Of the three, only Agbese turned up, he was later to find out that Soyinka had fled the country. Omeben also alleged that he was being pressured into naming Babangida and Akilu as suspects when he yet had no evidence linking them to the crime. Some of this pressure led to the formation of a special squad to investigate the case, the squad was headed by Assistant Commissioner of Police Abubakar Tsav. Omeben alleges that the then Inspector General of Police Gambo Jimeta has asked him to leave the case with the Tsav team out of anger at how messy the whole situation was getting.

Omeben also spoke about certain "fixations" in the minds of the general public about the case, in his own words "...There is the tendency for people to make up their minds as to what they want to see or hear. It may not necessarily be the truth and once they are so fixated, every other thing that somebody else would say would not mean anything to them. Dele Giwa’s case suffered such a fixation".

In testimony that he gave on 3 July 2001 before the Justice Oputa led Human Rights Violations Investigations Commission (HRVIC), Tsav alleged that the government stonewalled his investigation into the assassination. Tsav claimed that he was not granted permission to question key actors involved, including Tunde Togun, Ismaila Gwarzo and Haliru Akilu. He also said that he had requested that the privileges of these officers be withdrawn so he could take their statements and conduct a search of their offices and residences for items of evidential value but this request was denied. Tsav averred that in his final report, he had concluded that there was enough circumstantial evidence to accuse the duo of Togun and Akilu of conspiracy to murder but still the government did not make these two officers available for interrogation or a voice identification as he had requested.

Tsav claims that he handed the case file back to Chris Omeben. Tsav alleged that none of his recommendations were implemented, the case file was never returned to him and that there was no evidence that the case was transferred to another officer of agency. Tsav said he believed Giwa was killed because he believed Giwa was in "the way of some powerful forces".

After the investigation stalled, various conspiracy theories arose to explain why Giwa was killed. One of the most popular and still the most enduring has been the Gloria Okon connection. Gloria Okon was a Lady who was arrested in 1985 by the National Security Organization (NSO) at the Aminu Kano International airport on suspicion of drug smuggling. Soon after, the NSO alleged that she had died in custody, the government subsequently constituted a commission of inquiry to investigate the matter.

Conspiracy theorists allege that Gloria Okon was a drug mule working for the wife of General Ibrahim Babangida who was then the Minister of Defence in the regime of General Muhammadu Buhari. The theorists allege that during interrogation by the NSO Okon had claimed that she worked for highly placed Nigerians, in particular Babangida's wife. The theory goes on that Babangida spirited Okon out of detention to the United Kingdom, sold the public the ruse of a dead Gloria Okon and that Dele Giwa happened upon Okon on a trip to the UK where she told him her story. The story goes on that armed with this information, Giwa tried to blackmail the now Military President, Ibrahim Babangida and this was why he was killed. This blackmail theory might not be unconnected with the off-the-record interview that Lt Col A.K Togun gave to airport correspondents of the Guardian on 27 October 1986. In the interview, when asked about Dele Giwa's killing and the suspicion in the public that he was killed by the government, Togun was quoted as saying "...one person cannot come out to blackmail us. I am an expert in blackmail. I can blackmail very well. I studied propaganda so no one person can come and blackmail us after an agreement...". Togun's statement was in the context of the secret agreement reached by Giwa and other media executives at the October 9 meeting, he seemed to accuse Giwa of reneging on the agreement leading to Giwa being invited for questioning on 16 October. Theorists also allege that Babangida's drug running activities were brought to the attention of the Buhari-Idiagbon regime which led the regime to slate him for retirement on 1 October 1985. They also say that it was his impending retirement that inspired him to plan the coup that toppled Buhari in August 1985.

Giwa's colleagues at Newswatch have debunked this theory and deny any link between Giwa, Gloria okon and Mrs. Babangida. In a Newswatch interview marking the twenty fifth anniversary of the magazine, one of the founding partners of the organization Yakubu Mohammed explained the Giwa-Newswatch-Gloria Okon link. Mohammed claims that Dele Giwa had not been writing any Gloria Okon story and that the closest Newswatch got to a Gloria okon story was at one of the magazine's editorial conferences where a Newswatch reporter, Bose lasaki, who was a niece to President Olusegun Obasanjo spoke about a "rumour" making the rounds to the effect that Gloria okon had not died in detention but had been spirited out of the country. Mohammed claimed that Lasaki's story was dismissed off-hand but that she was asked to find out more about the rumour. Lasaki was alleged to have returned for the next editorial conference the following week and declared that there was no substance to the rumour. Mohammed alleged that Giwa was not at any of these meetings. The Ibrahim Babangida drug running angle was also called into question by revelations made by the embittered former head of the National Security Organization (NSO), Alhaji Mohammed Lawal Rafindadi. In 1985, following a request by the Supreme Military Council, the NSO under Rafindadi investigated Babangida and found him complicit of forgery and activities inimical to national security. This issue arose as a result of Babangida and his in-law, Mr Sunny Okogwu's interest in an arms manufacturing venture in Kaduna called Black Gold. The SMC, based on the NSO's findings slated Babangida for retirement. The only witness to the events shortly before the bomb exploded, Mr Kayode Soyinka had alleged that the package had a label with the seal of the Nigerian President and also claimed that the label indicated that it was form the office of the president. No other witness has corroborated this claim, Giwa's 17 year old son, Billy, who had delivered the package to Giwa has never corroborated this claim. Mr Soyinka's testimony about the events prior to and after the bombing have also been brought into question, there have been accusations made to the effect that he might have been the same person that detonated the bomb by remote control as he was not injured in the explosion. Soyinka had claimed that he had excused himself to go to the rest room as soon as the package was delivered, this was deemed suspicious because it was assumed that his journalistic curiosity would have been kept him in the room to know what the package contained if it indeed came from the President. Mr Soyinka is also alleged to have given conflicting accounts of the events to the Police and media outlets, he is also accused of fleeing the country while investigations were ongoing. Giwa's lawyer was also accused of prematurely accusing the government of Dele Giwa's murder thereby truncating the investigation into the case, Newswatch Magazine in a November 5, 1986 edition disowned Fawehimni.

The subsequent court cases instituted by Fawehinmi against the government to enable him try the case as a private prosecutor after the Director of Public Prosecution, Mrs. Eniola Fadayomi had refused to prosecute based on the evidence available were mostly unsuccessful. An excerpt of the Judgement by the then Lagos State Chief Judge, Justice Candido Johnson reads thus "...Even if one considers the reasonableness of time, I would say that the incident that gave birth to the death of the late Dele Giwa is not only unique in its form but also complex and would require sufficient time to conduct detailed and balanced investigation, a report on which the appropriate authority would reasonably act. The timing here appears hasty and premature. It appears impulsive without giving reasonable time and chance for a detailed and balanced investigation into this sordid incident. In the circumstances and having regard to the review made above, it is my ruling that this (ex-parte) application is misconceived and it is therefore dismissed. Leave to apply for mandamus is hereby refused.”

Fawehinmi went on to the Supreme Court and got a favourable judgement which enabled him go back to the Lagos State High Court, this judgement also mandated the Justice Candido to recluse himself from the case and appoint another judge to hear the case. On 23 February 1988, Justice Longe ruled that the two security officers, Lt. Col Tunde Togun and Col. Haliru Akilu could not be tried for the murder of Dele Giwa. In his ruling Justice Longe averred among other things that,"...the Attorney general did not oppose the objection raised by counsel to the ‘accused’ persons, Chief Rotimi Williams, on the ground that the information was filed by private prosecutor (Chief Gani Fawehinmi) when the information had not been completed and especially when the ‘INFORMATION IMPLICATED ONE OF THE PROSECUTION WITNESSES’(Kayode Soyinka)...the proof of evidence before the Court was mere HEARSAY…. Based on the evidence available before the court, it will be an abuse of the process of court to call the two security chiefs for trial. The information is therefore quashed accordingly.”

In 2001, General Ibrahim Babangida refused to testify before a national human rights commission about the Giwa murder. Babangida, Hakilu and Togun went to court and obtained an order restraining the commission from summoning them to appear before it. The Chairman of the commission commented that the commission had the power to issue arrest warrants for the trio but decided against this "in the over-all interest of national reconciliation".

In 2008 along with other activists such as Fela Anikulapo-Kuti and Ken Saro Wiwa, the Government of Nigeria named a street in the New Federal Capital Abuja after Dele Giwa.