August 26, 2021

The family of the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Super TV, Usifo Ataga, have asked the Inspector-General of Police to ensure a thorough and professional investigation into the killing of the media mogul.

They also demanded that justice be immediately served in the murder which they described as savage and barbaric.

Ataga’s family made the demands in an open letter to the police chief titled: THE GRUESOME AND HORRIFIC MURDER OF MR. MICHAEL USIFO ATAGA: A CLARION CALL FOR THOROUGH INVESTIGATION AND DELIVERY OF JUSTICE, dated August 25 through their lawyer and a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Mike Ozekhome.

The senior lawyer explained that the letter was made because Ataga’s killing has been in the public domain following the parade of the suspect involved by the Lagos State Police Command.

“We are Solicitors to the family of late Mr Michael Usifo Ataga (“Usifo”, “Ataga”, “our client”), who was brutally murdered on the 15th day of June, 2021, in the most horrific and spine-chilling circumstances ever imaginable.

“We write this letter to you to request, NOT FOR ANY SPECIAL FAVOURS, but that you use your good offices to ensure that THIS MURDER IS THOROUGHLY AND PROFESSIONALLY INVESTIGATED, PERPETRATORS PROSECUTED AND JUSTICE IMMEDIATELY SERVED in this savage and barbaric murder that cries to the high heavens for redress, the letter read in part.

According to him, the world has been following the case with keen interest to know how the nation’s criminal justice system works and how justice is eventually served to the suspect, the victim, and the society.

The letter noted further that, “We have advisedly decided to make this an open letter to you for the simple reason that the assassination of Mr Usifo Ataga has since been in the public domain, having been made so by your Commissioner in Charge of the Lagos State Police Command, Lagos State, Mr. Hakeem Odumosu, when he paraded the prime suspect, Miss Chidinma Adaora Ojukwu (“Chidinma”), before the media on the 24th of June, 2021.

“Consequently, the whole world has been following the murder’s unfolding melodrama with keen interest, to know the way and manner that Nigeria’s criminal justice system works and how justice is eventually served to the suspect, the victim and the society itself.”

Recall that Chidinma Ojukwu is a 21-year-old 300-level Mass Communication undergraduate of the University of Lagos, Akoka, Lagos State and Late Mr. Usifo Ataga, a 50-year-old married man, a father of two and the Chief Executive Officer of Super TV, was killed in a short-let apartment at No 19, Adewale Oshin Street, Lekki Phase 1,Lagos State on June 15, 2021.

Every information contained in this letter has been duly supplied to us by our client’s family; and also based on our direct access to and analysis of several media links that have since heavily publicised and widely circulated this cruel and heinous crime.

Ozekhome informed the IGP that every information contained in the letter was supplied to the law firm by Ataga’s family.