Unknown five hooded gunmen on Wednesday shot an accountant of the Ogun State Government, Taiwo Oyekanmi, dead and took off with the government’s funds.
Ogunwatch learned that Oyekanmi, the Director of Finance at the Governor’s office in Oke-Mosan, was ambushed by the gunmen while ascending the overhead bridge at Kuto and returning to the office after withdrawing an undisclosed sum of money from a Fidelity bank branch in Abeokuta.
According to sources, the thieves opened fire on the accountant, broke the door of the bullion van with sledgehammers and took off with the government’s money.
Oyekanmi and other aides who were shot during the attacks, according to insiders, were taken to the State General Hospital in Ijaye, where the accountant eventually passed away.
Ogunwatch learnt that the accountant’s police escort was not a member of the team because he had taken permission to attend to family matters.
According to the source, Tokunbo Talabi, the Secretary to the State Government, had previously paid the late accountant’s family a visit to express his condolences.
The Commissioner of Police, Abiodun Alamutu, confirmed the incident in a telephone interview our correspondent on Wednesday night.
He said “This afternoon, the accountant, the Director of Finance with driver and one other person left for Fidelity bank to make some withdrawal, they went with homemade bullion van. They were supposed to have a police escort, but for certain reasons, the person was permitted to travel to attend to some issues, so consequently he was not part of the movement to today.
“According to the story, after making the withdrawal, and on their way back to the office, they were accosted. A vehicle blocked them on top of the bridge, five occupants of the vehicle came down, shot at the director and from their vehicle, they brought out a sledge hammer to force the receptacle where the money was kept and they left with the money.
“As at that time there was no information, the police escort was not with the team and they sped off.
“The driver claimed to have trailed them to a point along conference hotel where he lost contact with them.
“The director that was shut was thereafter taken to Ijaye hospital where he eventually gave up the ghost.”
Alamutu said he had demanded for the CCTV footage from the bank to aid the police’s investigation.
“For our investigation, I have directed the area commander to get to the bank and request for the CCTV footage which will give us insight into the vehicle in question and possibility of identifying the culprits. if they ever ventured to step out of the vehicle or maybe they just maintained their position in the vehicle.
“I have reached out to Lagos and everywhere in the command to block all the exits out of the state, we are trying to identify them because they said they were five and they used hood.”
