Speaking with Punch in an interview, Adegbola, a lawyer herself, noted that the lack of justice in the Nigerian system that has made Ige’s death to go unpunished for so long showed that it was not worth it.
Late Bola Ige’s daughter, Funsho Adegbola
“Nigeria is not worth dying for. For my dad, that was his own belief (that whatever you live for is worth dying for), I don’t believe Nigeria is worth dying for because there hasn’t been justice. If somebody or some people are paying the price for his death, then I’ll know that Nigeria is worth dying for. My father believed too much in this Nigeria.
“Every time you said anything negative about the country, he would say no, Nigeria is going to be great, that Nigeria would someday be part of G7 and all that stuff. That was him, and I don’t condemn him for it. But as for me, Nigeria is not worth dying for. I’m going to live for my children, my grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
“God forbids anything to happen to you in this country, you are on your own. So, I’m not going to die for Nigeria. My father has already died for Nigeria; nobody in my family will ever die for Nigeria again.”
Adegbola also noted that Ige’s death remains blight on Nigeria’s history until justice is served. Besides, she said, the matter of political murders should be appropriately dealt with.
Late Chief Bola Ige
“I will speak as a lawyer and daughter of the late Chief Bola Ige. If we don’t get to the root of political murder in Nigeria, it will be like an open sore in the nation’s political and legal system. It is almost 15 years since my father was killed and nobody has been made to pay the price for the murder.
“It is a welcome development that the Federal Government is reopening the case. It is never over until it is over. I think any government that wants to redeem the image of this country and people’s faith in the system will like to put a legal closure to the matter.
“But as a child of God, even if the perpetrators of the murder are put in jail or executed, it does not amount to my father and it does not bring him back. In terms of that, we are not seeking vengeance because nothing can bring him back. But we are asking for justice. He was the Minister of Justice when he was killed, so justice should be done to the killing and moreover, to restore the hope of common man and young people in the justice system.
“Someone must stop this senseless killing in Nigeria. If people kill others and get away with it each time, for us, it’s not going to add to our faith in the legal system.
“However, what keeps me going is the fact that there is divine justice. The Bible says vengeance is the Lord’s. The battle is the Lord’s. My brother and I have done everything possible as children (of Ige) to ask for justice. When the murder trial was on, we both gave evidence so we could not have done anything less for our father who gave everything for us, for Nigeria. We leave the rest to the authority and to God.”
Naij
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