A Counsel to the Lagos State Government, Abiodun Owonikoko, has claimed that there are at least 40 errors in the report submitted by the Judicial Panel of Inquiry on Restitution for Victims of SARS Related Abuses and Other Matters.
Owonikoko, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, who served as counsel to the Lagos State Government during the year-long sitting of the EndSARS judicial panel made this known during an interview with Arise TV on Thursday.
Rcall that on Monday, November 15, the Lagos Judicial Panel submitted its report to the Lagos State Government.
Findings of the 309-page report which has been made public, listed 48 names as casualties of the October 20, 2020 Lekki tollgate shooting. 47 victims are said to be males, while one is female.
It also indicted the Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, Lekki Concession Company, the police, and the army.
However, Owonikoko said there are some errors in the findings in the report, adding that important details were omitted by the panel.
The lawyer said, “By law, the findings, conclusions, and recommendations of the panel were not supposed to be made public. The report making rounds on social media is a draft of a minority opinion because I was there all through the proceedings.
“I am particularly shocked to read what is contained in the report because it is not completely accurate. I sighted over 40 discrepancies in this report, including awarding N15 million to someone who was a witness to a police brutality incident that had nothing to do with the Lekki incident. What kind of report is that?
“All the evidence we were able to gather during the proceedings, none of them could be fully established.
“The mistake made by the government was not setting up an entirely different panel to look into the Lekki incident because there are some members of the panel that are protagonists in the case against the Police. They were not supposed to be a part of it.”
On October 19, 2020, as part of recommendations put forward during the #EndSARS protests, the Lagos government inaugurated the judicial panel chaired by Justice Doris Okuwobi to investigate petitions on police brutality in the state. The sitting was initially meant to last for six months but the period of proceedings stretched into one year. The panel concluded its sitting on October 18, 2021, and said its findings and recommendations would be submitted to the state government.
However, a youth representative on the Lagos judicial panel, Temitope Majekodunmi In a statement on Wednesday, said there were errors in the report but the errors were corrected before final submission.
He also added that the leaked report is not far from the original one. See Statement Below:
