Two months after the skull of Nigeria Police Corporal Rauf Fawale was allegedly smashed by officers of the Department of State Services (DSS) in Osun State, his family is getting death threats and the DSS has refused to release its officers for investigation.

Fawale, attached to Dada Estate Police Station, was severely injured in a fight among security officers on January 14, at a birthday party organised by his colleague, Inspector Modinat.

Three DSS operatives involved in the fracas descended heavily on Fawale and hit him from behind with a gun’s butt, damaging his skull, according to a petition by the Human Rights Committee of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) in Osun State to the Director General of the DSS; the Director of the DSS in Osun State, the Commissioner of Police in the State and the Chairman of the Police Service Commission.

“…the celebrant held on tight to one of the DSS operatives, Operative David Olowoporoku and demanded to know why he had smashed Cpl. Rauf, who as at then had already collapsed…but Inspector Modinat was consoled to take things easy and attend to her fallen colleague,” the petition partly read.

His battered body was dumped at the door of his house by two men who left without explaining to his wife, Mrs Bilikisu Fawale, what had happened. At the hospital, an X-ray confirmed that “his skull had been badly smashed and he has just little hope of survival”. On January 23, Fawale died.

“Don’t let me suffer in vain; this is injustice,” the deceased’s father, Pa Rabiu Fawale, told FIJ as he broke down in down in tears. “He was the one taking care of us and now we are hungry. My son was just promoted and he told me that even his colleagues were surprised that he got a promotion.”

Bilikisu said that her husband left her with three children; one of them was barely one-month-old when the breadwinner was killed. “It is so painful that if one finds poison, one would have taken it,” she said.

Broken and heavily in debt because of the late corporal’s medical bills, the family is now under pressure to not pursue justice. The pressure, according to the petition, came from Olobu of Ilobu, Oba Asiru Olatoye Olaniyan, who invited the deceased officer’s father to a meeting with Inspector Modinat and her husband to “forget seeking justice”. Oba Olaniyan was contacted but his phone was switched off. As of the time of publishing this report, FIJ was yet to get response to a text message sent to the monarch.

“Two times now, people had come to knock on the window, threatening us to drop the case or they will send us to where Fawale is. They would run away when we open the window. They are intimidating us,” Bilikisu told FIJ.  

SP Yemisi Opalola, spokeman of the police in Osun State, told FIJ that despite many visits by the Commissioner of Police, Olawale Olapade, to the DSS Director, the secret service did not respond to requests to release its officers for investigation.

“The CP has even written to police headquarters in Abuja and from there, they wrote to the headquarters of the DSS. Up till now, they are yet to release them for the proper thing to be done about them,” said Opalola.

The PRO claimed that although she was in contact with the wife of the deceased officer, she was not aware that the family was getting death threats and was getting pressure to let go of the pursuit for justice.

Peter Afunanya, public relations officer of the SSS was yet to reply to request for comment as of the time of publishing this report.

“Even if they can’t get the SSS operatives now, what about Inspector Modinat? Why has Inspector Modinat not being compelled by the Commission of Police to reveal the names of the operatives?” Barrister Lekan Alabi, the secretary of the Human Rights Committee of the NBA in Osogbo, asked.

“If this can happen to an officer and nothing is done to address it, then what about ordinary citizens of this country? Then we are all in trouble.”