Ace broadcaster and member of the Confederation of African Football (CAF) Media Committee, Aisha Falode, laments the murder of her only son, Oluwadamilola Oloruntoba Falode, in his Dubai apartment and a purported attempt at a cover-up by the police. She shares the emotional story with Gboyega Alaka
THERE were you when you got the call that something nasty might have happened to your son, Toba?
I was at home. It was between 3.05 and 3.07 in the morning, on a Saturday, February 15 (2014). I got the call from the security personnel at the apartments, where my son resided in Dubai that something nasty might have happened to my son, Toba. He was hysterical on the phone and disorientated. He just said “…your son’s friends… this is what I’ve been saying about his friends…” and then the line went dead. And then I was calling him back but he was no longer picking. And at a time, the phone was not ringing at all, and I was now calling my son’s phone, but it was also switched off. Then I remembered that during Christmas – we had spent Christmas with him in Dubai as a family; he had mentioned somebody that was very close to him, his friend, whose name is Peter (name has been changed to protect identity). I had spoken to him a couple of times and knew they were quite close. I also had his number and it was he that I finally called at that point. It was he who told me that my son had died. Just like that. Here was a boy I had spoken with hours earlier in the afternoon of Friday after church service (Friday is their equivalent of Sunday in Dubai) and full of life and cheery. I asked how because by that time, questions were just rising in my head- and he said ‘He fell from the balcony!’ Now you can imagine my anguish. My own son falling from a 17 floor balcony! It was hard to believe. I asked ‘Where is he now?’ and he said ‘He is here with me.’ I said ‘where?’ and he said ‘in his apartment’ and that he was waiting for the ambulance and police to arrive. I told him, ‘Please tell them not to move him in the next 30 minutes, because I was going to start calling pastors to start praying for him; my son cannot just die like that.’ I also said to him, ‘You too start praying for your friend’, to which he replied that that’s what he was doing. So that was how I got to know that my son had passed on. It took us another week and half to be able to bring his body back home for his final rites. The police report that came with the body was a preliminary police report that said that he had fallen from a height and that the impact of the fall was the cause of death. It also said that since everybody in the apartment at the time (they claimed there were five of them, plus my son, six) had given the same statement, which was that he was alone in the balcony, sitting and swinging on the railing, and that there were traces of alcohol in his system, therefore the cause of death would be as a result of that fall.
Would this be a school hostel accommodation?
No, it’s a private residence. Apartment 1703, Manchester Towers in Dubai Marina. The school, SAE Institute, does not have accommodation, so students have to secure accommodation for themselves. It is a 30-storey building and Toba was staying in one of the apartments on the 17th floor. Now when they said he was sitting on the balcony and fell, that kind of raised my suspicion because I know the balcony and I know the railing and knew that it was impossible for anyone to sit on the balcony, let alone swing back and forth. Even if he was drunk! But at that time, I was dealing with the grief, which I’m still dealing with now, coupled with the fact that we needed to bring him home and bury.
At what point did you begin to suspect a police cover-up?
At the point when they said that he was alone at the balcony; that there had been a guy with him, that he was sitting on the balcony, that he had been told to get down from the balcony and that he wouldn’t listen and that the guy had gone back into the living room, where others were staying and when he came back, he was no longer there and concluded that he had fallen. I just thought this story does not sound right. I also remember that one of the witnesses I called had told me that he fell from the balcony and that he was with him in the apartment, meaning he was with him in the room. And I thought if he fell from the balcony, why was he in the room, why were you in the room with him? It just probably meant that he was not alone.
Faisal Aldakmary Al-Naseer is obviously the chief suspect from the letter your lawyer, Festus Keyamo, wrote to the Minister of Foreign Affairs. Did you ever meet him as one of Toba’s friends?
The only person I knew was the friend I called; and we only spoke on the phone. So I’d become suspicious, but immediately after the burial, I also had to travel because the incident affected me very badly and I had to go and seek some help. It was while I was abroad that I had the time to reflect and came to a conclusion that I have to at least know how my son died. Maybe that will give me some peace and closure. The fact that I don’t know is putting a burden on me and I owe it to my son to find out what happened since he is not around to speak for himself. So I got in touch with some lawyers who told me that in Dubai private prosecution is not possible – because I had said that I wanted a reinvestigation of the whole thing and that if there was any culpability, then there should be a legal redress. They told me that only public prosecution is possible and that I as an individual cannot take anybody to court or say that I wanted a reinvestigation. Only the state, they told me, can do that. But now I have a problem with the police, which literally is the state because I don’t think they had done a thorough job in coming to their conclusion on my son’s death. You cannot say that since everybody gave the same account of the event that led to my son’s death, therefore it is true and requires no further investigation. So I came back to Nigeria, spoke to Festus Keyamo and he said he has some lawyer friends in Dubai whom we can speak with on the matter and find out what can be done. Of course they told him the same story that I already knew, that private prosecution is not possible. Meanwhile, when they went to bring my son home, I had requested for them to give me the full investigative file of the police and the medical report, forensic report, whatever report they could garner; and again they said this was not possible for me as an individual; and that I could only do it through the Nigerian embassy over there. Of course we did that and until this moment, almost three months after the incident, we still don’t have any reply. Although the embassy told me last week that they had something for me from the police and that they had put it in the post. But I went to Dubai; I found that I needed to go and find out things for myself. I thought if I could get two out of the five witnesses to tell me what happened and compare their stories, then I would at least have an idea of what really happened and have a measure of rest. So I got in touch with one of the witnesses after some persuasions. Initially, he wasn’t picking, but I finally got through to his mother, who expressed her regrets at what happened and said she had been eager to meet with me. Eventually, we met physically and I had to tell them that the police had invited me because they had a new lead in the investigation. I figured that if I told them the truth that I was investigating Toba’s death, they would probably shut down. I requested to speak with her son, so as to be armed with some level of information before meeting the police. So we started with the incident of the altercation between Faisal and Toba, sometime in December, because of Olivia the British girl and how they had gone to a night club on the night of the incident, and that Faisal and Olivia had a heated argument at the club and that Tyler (Toba) was not in any way involved in the argument and that another boy, a friend who was at the club with them, was also involved in the argument in some way. The witness also told me that although he was not close enough to them to know what the argument was about, but he could see that it was not something good. At some point, Olivia and Faisal left the club and it was concluded that they had gone home. The rest of them: my son, three other guys left at the close of the club to go back to Toba’s apartment and they were all shocked to find Faisal and Olivia waiting by the door. Olivia, he said was obviously distressed and crying, and Faisal had this hard look about him. They actually thought that they had come over to sort everything out, so they all went into Toba’s apartment. Toba, Olivia and Faisal went into the bedroom, with Toba obviously trying to be the peacemaker. Later the three of them came out and went to the balcony. He also said that the rest of them were listening to music in the living room and wouldn’t know what was happening at the balcony or whether there was an argument. The next thing, they said, was Olivia rushing in from the balcony, followed by Faisal to announce that Toba had fallen from the balcony. He also said they noticed a splatter of blood on Faisal’s T-shirt, and that he also had cuts and bruises on his hands and was telling them all not to worry, that maximum he would do 25 years in prison. So they rushed out and found that he was indeed no longer on the balcony. They rushed to the ground floor and found him lying lifeless on the pavement.
Couldn’t it be that Toba was struggling to hold onto Faisal for survival?
Apparently that was his reply. They inquired about the bruises all over him and the blood and he said it happened while he was trying to hold on to him. But to me, it does not gel still. The apartment is a small one and they ought to have seen or heard what was going on there because the balcony is only separated by a glass door. They also claim that the glass was drawn and they didn’t see what was happening. Seeing that this testimony is different from the one the police had given me, I asked him, did you give the police this version? That Faisal, Olivia and Toba were on the balcony when the incident happened? And they said yes. The mother also confirmed his statement, saying she was there when he gave it. I then told them that the reason I was asking was because the report I got from the police was that he was alone on the balcony when he fell and that this was the account all the witnesses gave. So I asked if the young man could write down what he had told me and sign, because I needed to hold onto something while talking to the police, and he said yes. Even the mother said ‘why not?’ and that she could even accompany me to the station because she knew what her son told the police. They also said another of their friend and witness also gave the same statement. So that confirmed my suspicion that there is a conspiracy. So after this gentleman wrote the statement and signed it in the presence of his mother, they left. It was now for me to meet another of his friend, an African. If anybody would tell me the truth, it had to be him, I thought to myself. I asked around and got his number and met him after some hitches. Incidentally, he attended the same church as my son, so the pastor was also trying to reach him for us. Between the time we were waiting for him, Festus (Keyamo) went to the apartment to assess the setting of the incident. So we spoke to this gentleman and he also gave the same account as the gentleman we had spoken to earlier, though with slight variations. At some point, he heard heated argument, lifted the curtain, saw Faisal throwing his arms up in anger and he just assumed it was a mere argument that would be sorted out and continued watching TV, only for Olivia and Faisal to walk in minutes later announcing that Toba had fallen from the balcony. He also confirmed the splatter of blood.
Having established that there are disparities in their accounts, why do you think the police would be attempting this cover-up?
According to our investigation, we learnt that Faisal’s father is a Saudi Arabian and that he is powerful and influential and has quite an appreciable investment in Dubai. I don’t want to come into conclusion, but if you have deliberately left out vital facts from witnesses’ statements or left out the facts completely, then it must be that some kind of hierarchy or compelling profit is making you do what you are doing as law officers. I also told our afternoon guest to write and signed his statement. Thereafter, he told us that he had remembered something that he thought is important, which was that the spot where Toba’s body was lying was too far from the building for somebody who had fallen. Festus also noticed this absurdity. He said it was like 18 to 20 metres from the building. It was even outside the perimeter fencing. So if the police saw this, even without the witnesses’ statements, one would expect them to become suspicious; that this was more than an ordinary fall. So everything reeks of conspiracy and it is really worrisome.
What do you think was the crux of the argument between Faisal, Olivia and Toba?
Toba was not involved in the argument that night, according to the story. But in December, there had been an altercation between Faisal and Toba, because he had accused Olivia of cheating on him, with Toba. So on this night, it’s either they were still arguing about the fact that she was still dating Toba. Well, we can only make assumptions now.
You have this letter addressed to the Minister of Foreign Affairs; what’s your prayer?
My prayer is that my son might be gone but if the life of a citizen is taken then there must be justice. We’re telling our government to tell the Dubai government to reopen investigations into my son’s death and get to the root of the matter. A life has been taken here, violently, in the most gruesome manner. This was his own apartment and there was a security post at the entrance. How come Faisal and Olivia were able to even get into the building and to Toba’s apartment entrance without signing in? Why did the police say they all gave the same statements? Why did the police not take the blood-stained T-shirt from Faisal and take the blood samples…? So many whys and you could only begin to overlook them all if you’re trying to cover up certain things or if you think it’s a non-issue. But taking a life is a big issue. We spoke to the Ambassador and he told us that in the month that my son died, there must have been at least five cases of Nigerian students’ death in Dubai in similar mysterious circumstances and that he could not understand why Nigerian parents keep sending their children to study in the country. And I told him that ‘Sir, with all due respect, did you share this information with anybody? If you’re not telling me now, then I wouldn’t know; so it is the responsibility of the Nigerian embassy, like they do in the United States and the UK, to inform and warn citizens of danger-prone zones. We need Nigerian government to start placing premium on every Nigerian life and stand up to their responsibilities. It is not my responsibility to go about asking questions about how my son died. Now this is not about my son alone anymore. Nigerians must get protection from our government anywhere, more-so where there has been injustice. With these compelling evidence, I am 100% sure that some people will be found guilty.
What kind of boy was Toba?
Toba was a gentle boy. He was loving; he was giving, he was respectful. I have never seen a boy with such humility. If you went to his condolence page that was created for him on facebook, you will know what I mean. Even his alma mater, Atlantic Hall, held a memorial for him and took newspaper advertorials for him. I will show you the testimonial from the school in Dubai. You know, they also held a memorial for him in the school in Dubai; and he only began schooling there last October. So he must have made quite an impression and his death is very devastating for me. Toba was very passionate about music. He wanted to be a musician; he wanted to be a promoter; he wanted to be the Don Jazzy of his generation and he was driven by that. And that was why he went to study Audio Production at the SAE Dubai.
Chairman of the House Committee on Diaspora affairs, Abike Dabiri-Erewa, has been particular about cases of Nigerians being killed, but it seems the problem is too overwhelming for her.
On the contrary, Hon Dabiri-Erewa has been very helpful and effective. You know anything we need to do in Dubai, we need to go through the embassy and she was constantly over the phone with the Ambassador over this matter. That was when it just happened. But I now have to get back to her with the information and document I now have. Do you know there was a story of another Nigerian student doing his Master’s degree, whom they said fell off a yacht? I’m sure if you look at it closely, there is a story behind it.
Can the world ever get to see the same old Aisha Falode?
No. Aisha Falode can never be the same again. You see I am only here talking to you by the grace of God. I have just two of them and he was my only son. But even if I have ten of them, what happened to me is the worst nightmare any mother can ever go through. To lose a child, and in that manner! I can never be the same. I can never be the same. It’s never going to be the same. My family has been destroyed for life, because we lost a part of us.
