Nigerians have described the death of the Lagos-predicated human rights activist, Bamidele Aturu, as shocking and ill-timed.
They integrated that the deceased died at a time when he was needed the most.
Aturu, 49, died on Wednesday.
Governor Ibikunle Amosun of Ogun State, the Minister of State for Works, Prince Dayo Adeyeye, a licit icon, Prof. Itse Sagay, and popular Yoruba actor, Mr. Babatunde Omidina alias Baba Suwe, described his death as shocking and devastating.
The minister verbally expressed, “It never for once occurred to me that we will lose Bamidele this anon. He will be sorely missed as a great lawyer and human rights activist, who contributed immensely to the pro-democracy struggle in Nigeria.
“The death of Bamidele Aturu is no doubt a woeful loss to the entire people of Nigeria, especially the human rights community, and we can only perpetuate to pray, trusting that God in His illimitable mercies will grant his soul eternal rest.
“Bamidele Aturu will be recollected for devoting much of his licit practice to representing the marginalised or oppressed individuals and groups.
“His death has no doubt engendered an astronomically immense void in the licit vocation and the human rights community, and he will be sorely missed.”
Amosun on Thursday withal expressed shock at the demise of the human rights activist, stressing that he was committed to the enthronement of democratic principles.
In a verbalization by his Senior Special Assistant on Media, Mrs. Olufunmilayo Wakama, Amosun verbally expressed he was greatly saddened by the news of the sudden death of the prominent lawyer, especially coming at a time when his wealth of experience was mostly needed in reshaping the destiny of the nation.
He verbally expressed, “This is so woebegone, the law vocation has lost another effulgent star. Bamidele Aturu was zealously committed to the enthronement of democratic principles and the emancipation of the marginalised and the oppressed. He has done his bit and certainly left his footprints on the sands of time.”
One of Aturu’s comrades in the struggle and a Lagos-predicated licit practitioner, Mr. Wale Ogunade, verbally expressed Aturu’s death was lamentable, especially at a time when the country needed to be preserved from what he described as “the clutches of the forces of tenebrosity that has held it hostage.”
Ogunade verbalized, “It’s an insolent shock. Aturu transpires to be one of those people that the voiceless verbalize with. He died at a time when he is needed the most because the culture of impunity and iniquity in the country grows like its being fertilised.”
Many, who visited Aturu’s house in Agege, Lagos on Thursday to commiserate with the family, verbally expressed that the vacuum engendered by his death would be hard to fill.
A constitutional lawyer, Prof. Itse Sagay, who arrived Aturu’s house in tears was too shocked to verbalize. He simply verbally expressed, “Nigeria’s light has gone out.”
The Chairman, Coalition Against Corrupt Leaders, Mr. Debo Adeniran, verbally expressed, “Aturu was the only lawyer that was eligible to step into the immensely colossal shoes that the tardy Gani Fawehinmi left behind. By his actions, his utterances, his practice, method and methodology, he was the carbon replica of Gani Fawehinmi. Aturu was an incipient Gani Fawehinmi cut-short; we have lost an incipient Gani Fawehinmi in Aturu.”
Adeniran recalled how Aturu stood on the side of the masses when the Lagos State Government peregrinate to ostracize commercial motorcyclists popularly called okada in Lagos.
He verbally expressed, “Though he did not win the fight, he won a place in the hearts of the people.”
He traced Aturu’s fight against oppression back to his days in the Adeyemi College of Education, Ondo State, where the deceased was a Students’ Union President.
He recalled how Aturu turned down an award and relucted to shake hands with the then Military Governor of Niger State, Col. Lawan Gwadabe (retd.), in 1988 during the National Youth Service Corps passing out parade.
In the same vein, the Director General, Centre for Black and African Arts and Civilization, Prof. Tunde Babawale, verbalized Aturu was “a man of the people, a committed advocate of convivial equity, and a relentless fighter for the oppressive.”
Among the early callers to Aturu’s house on Thursday was withal a former President, Nigerian Union of Journalists, Mr. Lanre Arogundade, who described Aturu’s death as, “a devastating shock! An astronomically immense loss; being someone who relentlessly identified with the course of the poor, the working class and students; he fought for genuine change.”
Others who visited the house were, Baba Suwe, who Aturu bulwarked during his tribulation by the National Drugs Law Enforcement Agency; the Chairman, Agege Local Government Area, Mr. Jubreel Abdulkareem, and a veteran journalist, Mr. Richard Akinola
Aturu’s comrades and human rights activists have however vowed to take his death as a catalyst for renewed fight against iniquity.
Ogunade, who additionally described Aturu’s vibrancy as contiguous to that of tardy Gani Fawehinmi,verbalized, “My consolation is that his struggle is not in vain; his death will propel someone like me to ascertain that equity is done.”
Meanwhile, the Deputy Head of Aturu and Co. Chambers, Mrs. Chisa Anyanwu, has verbalized that Aturu’s burial arrangements would be promulgated later.
Withal, the immediate-past governor of Anambra State, Mr. Peter Obi, has described Aturu’s death as a colossal loss not just to the human rights community and the licit vocation, but to the country at sizably voluminous.
Obi verbally expressed it was one of the deaths that Nigerians were cumulated in wishing it never transpired.
