Reckoning day beckons for alleged notorious assassin, Adeola Williams a.k.a. Ade Lawyer. Arrested by the police after weeks of manhunt over the assassination of one Ganiyu Ayinla, he decided to lay bare his activities as a hired killer, admitting responsibility not just for Ayinla’s death but also for others in Lagos and other parts of the Southwest.
In this, he said, he had the backing of a former chairman of the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) in Lagos State, Mr. Rafiu Olohunwa, claiming that he was commissioned by Olohunwa to snuff life out of one Azeez Adekunle Lawal a.k.a. Kunle Poly, the current chairman of the Lagos Island branch of NURTW. In the process, however, he killed Ayinla, who happened to be Lawal’s personal assistant, on January 23.
A manhunt launched by the police resulted in the arrest of Williams in his newly rented apartment in Akure, Ondo State. Police sources revealed that upon interrogation, he confessed to the assassination of Ayinla and numerous other victims in the Southwest.
Williams was quoted as saying that Olohunwa hired him to kill Lawal with a promise to pay him N1.5 million for the job, with N500,000 as advanced payment, while the remaining N1 million would be paid after the assassination.
It turned out, however, that the hired assassin and his gang members erroneously killed Ayinla as he rode in the same car with Lawal, who miraculously escaped with bullet wounds. The mix-up, Williams said, caused Olohunwa to withhold the balance of N1 million, forcing him to confiscate Olohunwa’s SUV until he would pay the outstanding sum.
Although he denied sponsoring Ayinla for any assassination assignment, Olohunwa has since been arrested by operatives of the Inspector General of Police Intelligence Response Team (IRT). The police also said that efforts were being made to arrest the remaining members of William’s killer gang.
Confessing his exploits as an assassin, Williams, a 39-year-old native of Ijebu Igbo, Ogun State, described himself as a secondary school drop-out on account of his stubborn nature. He said he became a houseboy after dropping out of school.
“I later ran away from the house to become a bus conductor on Lagos Island, Ojuelegba and Victoria Island routes. I did that for about three years before I became a driver.
“In 1998, I was arrested by the police and taken to Ikoyi Prison because I snatched the late Fuji musician, Sikiru Ayinde Barrister’s wristwatch during a show at City Hall, Lagos Island. A fight broke out as he was about to leave the hall, so I found my way to the front and snatched the watch from his wrist. People saw me struggling with his bouncers. The next day, they brought policemen to look for me at Lagos Island.
“I was arrested from my mother’s house and taken to the Zone 2 Police Command Onikan, before I was charged to court and remanded at Ikoyi Prison. Two years into my incarceration, some inmates on awaiting trial staged a violent protest at the Ikoyi Prison over their long stay in prison without trial, and I joined them. The protest turned into a riot and many inmates attempted to escape from the prison. Some were killed by soldiers who were sent to the prison to quell the riot, while others sustained serious injuries.
“The next day, the prison authorities came because of the riots and transferred all the awaiting trial inmates in that prison. I was taken to the Kirikiri Maximum Prison where I spent additional five months before I was taken to court and was eventually released in 2001.
“After my release, I went back to Ajah and started working again as a bus conductor and driver. I worked in Ajah for about two years before I joined the National Union of Road Transport Workers (NURTW) at the Ajah branch, and I was made a parking attendant at Phase One Unit in Ajah in 2004.
“After a while, I became the King of Boys and started collecting N50 from every bus that came into the park. I later turned the place into a unit and started collecting N100 as security money from every commercial vehicle that made a turn at the Ajah Garage.
“I recruited some boys who started working with me. At the end of each day, we would share all the money collected and give a part of it to the chairman of the unit where we worked. I did that for about six years before the Ajah branch chairman died and a caretaker committee, led by one Mustapha Sagoe, was sent by the then state chairman to take over the branch.
“The caretaker committee stopped my job and I went to Sagoe, who I knew very well because he is also from the Lagos Island, and begged him to allow me retain the job. I told him it was my only means of survival and I had no other place to go. He promised to return the job to me, but I waited for two years and didn’t get back the job. Each time I went to Sagoe, he would tell me to wait. I became frustrated and decided to invest the remaining money I made from the Ajah garage on illicit drugs.
“I went to Ghana where I met with people producing skunk, an illicit drug which looks more like Indian hemp, and I bought large quantities from them and they brought it down to Benin Republic for me. I also bought two used cars from Benin Republic, which I used in smuggling the drugs into Nigeria. I did that successfully on three occasions. But on my fourth trip, the police in Benin Republic intercepted my goods and seized everything.
“I was back to square one and I had no money to fend for my wife and only child. I went back to Lagos Island, met Sagoe and told him what I was going through. I told him that he was leaving me with no option but to go into crime, since he did not want to return my job in Ajah. He snubbed me, and the boys who were with him chased me away.
“I felt so bad about it and thought about going into armed robbery. But I knew it was a very risky business, hence I opted to start afresh. I went to Ikota Housing Estate in Ajah and started peddling Indian hemp on the streets. In fact, I was even buying from people who I was formerly selling to, and some even sold to me on credit, which to me was very humiliating.
So, when I heard that a fight had broken out between Musiliu Akinsanya, also known as MC-Oluomo, who was the treasurer at the Lagos State Chapter of the NURTW, and Akanni Olohunwa, who was the state chairman in 2010, I saw a huge opportunity to pay back Sagoe, a strong supporter of MC-Oluomo, for the evil he did to me.
“I approached Olohunwa and volunteered to work and fight for him, hoping I was going to regain all that I had lost through him. I was always with him during that period, and whenever supporters of Mc-Oluomo and Sagoe attacked him, I was always on hand to defend him.
“Later on, I heard that Sagoe and MC-Oluomo had started fighting Agbede, the NURTW chairman of Lagos State. I came back into town and approached Agbede and offered my support to him. I also offered to fight alongside him and he promised to give me back my job if he became the substantive NURTW chairman of Lagos State. I mobilised all my boys in Ajah and we had his picture posted in all our parks in Ajah.
“He won the election eventually, but he reneged on his promise. I tried reaching him several times but he was not picking my calls. I also went to the state office to see him but I was not allowed. After waiting for some months, I contacted Kunle Poly and he promised to speak to Agbede.
“I met Kunle Poly twice in his house in Ajah and I begged him to speak to Agbede on my behalf and he promised that he would work on it, but he didn’t do anything. I became so angry and went to MC- Oluomo’s camp, because I learnt that he was also vying to become the next Lagos State Chairman of the NURTW. I contacted him through his personal assistant and conveyed my loyalty to him.
“I told him all my problems and how Agbede and Kunle Poly used and dumped me. I volunteered to help him achieve his aims to become the next state chairman. He accepted my pleas and placed me on N100,000 monthly salary.
“Though the salary was not so constant, it was helping me. While we were on it, there was this car I was using. On May 1, 2017, Olohunwa called to say he had a job for me in Osun State and wanted me to drive down to Lagos State from Ibadan to join his convoy. He promised to reward me handsomely.
“But on my way from Lagos, I had an accident. My car summersaulted and Olohunwa and his convoy met me at that spot. They took me to the occasion and brought me back. Then Olohunwa promised to replace my damaged car for me.
“I told MC-Oluomo about it and he advised me to exercise some patience, assuring me that Olohunwa would get me a new car. I obeyed MC-Oluomo’s advice, but Olohunwa did not keep his promise. Eight months later, I was forced to snatch a Hyundai SUV from one of his drivers in place of my car.
“Before then, I was also accused of killing Hamburger. People accused me of being responsible for the killing because I was close to MC-Oluomo, but I had no hand in it. But I took part in chasing away members of the caretaker committee who were sent to Oshodi to take over Mc-Oluomo’s park after the crisis that followed Hamburger’s death.
“On January 19, 2018, three days before we went for the assasination of Kunle Poly, I approached one of Olohuwa’s drivers, Sadoka, and I took his Toyota Camry car and asked him to go and bring Olohunwa’s car for me before I would release his to him, because he was aware that I lost my car while working for Olohunwa.
“He then brought a Hyundai SUV, 2015, belonging to Olohunwa to me, and I kept it in a car park beside Mc-Oluomo’s house in Ajao Estate. After I collected the vehicle, Olohunwa called me and I told him that his vehicle was with me and I would give it back to him when he had replaced my own damaged car.
“Later on, I thought about my predicament because my wife was heavily pregnant and the money I was getting from Oluomo was not enough, and I was not ready to use my gun for armed robbery. So I decided to end the life of the man who refused to help me mend my relationship with Agbede.
“I then thought about killing him and decided to take advantage of the ongoing supremacy battle between Kunle Poly boys and Abija boys at the Lagos Island. I took four of my friends to attack Kunle Poly and we opened fire on him and he escaped. But someone who was wearing the same cloth with him was gunned down.
“We then received a retaliatory attack from some of Kunle Poly’s men and we quickly left the scene in our waiting vehicle. We then parked the vehicle in a school in Isale Eko because the tyre got burst and a bullet also punctured the engine of the vehicle. We then went to Ajao Estate that night. Then the police in Lagos State traced the vehicle to Ibadan and they arrested the owner known as John, and I relocated to Akure. John confessed to the police that I led the attack.
“Two weeks later, I saw some policemen who came and arrested me. I knew my life was over the moment the policemen said that I was arrested over the murder of Kunle Poly’s PA. I quickly decided that I was not going to go down alone. I decided to rope in Olohunwa because he was the one who ruined my life.
“It was my support for him during fight with MC-Oluomo that made me lose my position at the union, and after he was removed from office, he had so much money but he refused to help me.”
