Three years after the demise of Football legend, Rashidi Yekini, his family members are still locked in a fierce battle over the estate of the soccer star.
Jubril Olanrewaju Mohamed, personal lawyer and close aide to Yekini while he was alive, in this exclusive interview with Premium Times recounts the sad death of the football star, insisting there was foul play and that justice has by no means been served. He also explained how challenging it has been keeping Yekini’s estate for the rightful owners- his two daughters, Yemisi and Mariam.
Below are excerpts of the interview;
Jubril: Jubril Olanrewaju Mohamed is
my name; I was the lawyer to Late Rasheed Yekini and counsel to his estate.
PT: How has the task of keeping
Yekini’s estate being for you?
Jubril: It has been a challenging
time in the sense that I had to ensure that the estate he left behind is not
taken away from the beneficiaries he left behind, that is his two children.
They are grown up children and to ensure that they are psychologically stable
has been challenging.
PT: There are talks that Yekini had
more than two children. Has there been any claim from anywhere else?
Jubril: A Togolese lady came with a
three-year old girl eight days after his death claiming that Yekini was the
father of the child. The mother (Yekini’s mum) accepted and other members of
the family. Yekini actually confessed to the relationship and one and half
years after the relationship was over she came back saying she was pregnant. It
even caused misunderstanding between him and his mum because he refused to
accept the child but his mother accepted saying the more the merrier. We asked
her to do a DNA after she came back but up till now we haven’t ascertain the
authenticity of the child’s paternity.
PT: So back to Yekini’s estate, we
hear all is not well as regards that
Jubril: The family called a number of
times asking that the properties be sold and shared among themselves. I however
told them their suggestion was unlawful, even Islamically because he had
children and a mother. He (Yekini) gave his mother some property and it would
be wrong of me to take it away from her. Also the rest of his property, he gave
no instructions on how to do deal with it. His mansion in Ibadan is still being
maintained and we have looked for an estate manager to help us look for anyone
who is interested in the property to lease it because the money you would get
from there would be substantial. At the moment the respective mothers are the
ones taking care of their children with a little input from me. Yekini has the
BQ, the five flats of three bedroom at Ijagbo, then the mansion.
Right now however, they (the children)
get nothing from the estate as we are still waiting on the lease of the mansion
since the mother takes all the proceeds from the other properties. The family
members feel they are entitled to whatever comes from the leasing but I have
said no, that these two children are basically and primary beneficiary of that
estate. They can meet their mother for part of what she is getting from
Ijagbo’s property which is massive but as for this one, no way.
My jurisdiction is limited to this
one mansion because I do not want to stop what Yekini did not stop in his life
time. The property would naturally revert back to Yekini’s estate after her
demise and according to our traditions, no elderly person wants to be left
behind while their child or grandchild dies, so the rent that accrues after her
demise becomes that of Yekini’s children.
PT: You have fingered foul play in
the death of Yekini, do you still maintain such stance?
Jubril: I maintain that stance
because of the circumstances surrounding his death. He did not die naturally
and I asked some questions on the circumstances leading to his death and they
have not been able to provide me with answers. According to the report of his
late younger sister who died shortly after he died and was the mastermind of his
abduction, she said that morning of May 4, she said they gave him tea because
he was tied down because they felt he would escape if they did not tie him
down. She said Yekini begged to be released to see me and that he was being
smoldered where he was. It was after he took a cup of tea which he requested
for, he became restless and started gasping for breath. That was when they took
him to a nearby hospital Al-Amin Hospital in Apete, in Ibadan.
According to the doctor who attended
to him, Yekini was virtually dead when he was brought in because the pulse was
actually very feeble before he could do anything the man was gone. So I wanted
to see those guys who took him away and ask them what his treatment plan was
because you can’t die in such circumstances and it would not raise suspicion.
By the laws in Lagos state, there would have been an inquest into his death;
the coroner should have been brought in to verify the cause of his death. That
was what I was asking for. The family members might have had genuine reasons
for doing what they did and I was not out to persecute them. I just wanted to
know the cause of Yekini’s death. Just like what happened to Michael Jackson,
there was an inquest. If it were a nobody now, we could just overlook such
things but a whole Rasheed Yekini was taken to the native doctor forcefully and
he died there and we did not know the cause of his death.
PT: Do you think you could have done
more to avert Yekini’s death?
Jubril: Yes, I wish I did more to
keep him safe. I thought the police order was good enough but may be stationing
a policeman would have been better. I was disappointed that the police failed
to make any arrest and ended up calling it a family affair and saying no one
had come to declare their grievances. I asked them if there was a corpse lying
in the street would they leave it there because no one came to report? They
however were waiting for me to write a petition and I did not do that because I
expected the police to bring up the coroner law and find out the cause of death
of a man who was kidnapped from his house and later found dead despite an order
restraining some people.
PT: Finally how are Yekini’s children
faring?
Jubril : Yemisi is close to 20 and
the other is 15. The 20-year-old is studying at the University of Leicester
where she is studying performing arts. The second one is in Osogbo. She will be
writing her final year exams soon.
No comments:
Post a Comment