Dele Giwa’s Mom Dies At 87

Elekiya Ayisat Giwa, the mother of the founding Editor-In-Chief of Newswatch magazine, Dele Giwa, who was killed in 1986 by a parcel bomb during the heady days of the military junta, is dead.

Madam Giwa, who was 87 years old, died at about 5 a.m. on Tuesday at the Aruna Ogun Hospital, Ikorodu, Lagos after a brief illness which family sources said was aged-related.

Ronke Aboaba, the deceased’s daughter, said that the family are still making arrangements to take her to the morgue at the General Hospital, Ikorodu.

Also confirming the incident to P.M.NEWS, the President of Women Arise, Dr. Joe Okei-Odumakin, said the burial plans would be announced after a meeting of the deceased’s family members.

She also said the octogenarian died of a brief illness.

Elekiya, it is believed, died without fulfilling the dream of seeing the killers of her son brought to book.

She had constantly accused former military dictator, General Ibrahim Babangida of masterminding her son’s assassination on 19 October, 1986.

The late Dele Giwa was killed through a parcel bomb in suspicious circumstances under the Babangida-led military junta.

During one of her speeches, she said she would forever mourn her son and curse those behind his death.

Accusing Babangida, she had asked: “what can I react to? Is it that Babangida has been killed? Or what has anybody done to him that I can react to?

“The stand of  the family is that Babangida should be killed.”

—Eromosele Ebhomele