The Ekiti State Judicial Panel of Inquiry on Human Rights Violations has recommended payment of N500,000 as compensation to Mrs Ogunleye Ajayi, wife of a murdered officer in the disbanded police Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS).
The panel, presided over by its chairman, Justice Cornelius Akintayo (Rtd), recommended the payment of the amount at its resumed sitting in Ado-Ekiti on Thursday.
Newsmen report that the deceased, Sgt. Musiliu Ajaiyi, was murdered by unknown persons sometime in 2019.
Akintayo said the panel established the facts of the case and made appropriate recommendations from the oral and documentary evidence of the complainants, produced through exhibits tendered as well as visits to the scene of the murder.
He, therefore, ordered the Nigerian Police Force to investigate the circumstances that led to the death of the late officer and that the police authority should compensate the wife adequately.
He said the recommendation from the panel was just for the upkeep of the late officer’s wife and children.
Newsmen report that the wife of the late officer, who had earlier appeared before the panel, said under cross-examination that the death of her husband, sometime in early 2019, had remained a mystery to her.
She explained that her husband left for work on his motorcycle around 6.30 a.m. that fateful day, only to be called around 8.30 am that her husband was dead.
She confirmed to the panel that the marks she saw on the corpse of her husband revealed that he was gruesomely murdered by unknown persons.
The mother of four, who is a petty trader, pleaded for the sponsorship of her children’s education, claiming that her late husband was the breadwinner of the family.
When asked if she reported the incident to the police authority, she said she was not in a stable condition to report as at when the incident happened.
