By Kingsley Omonobi

ABUJA—The Police in Abuja, yesterday, established a prima facie case of attempted murder of billionaire businessman and son of a former Lagos State Governor, Chief Femi Otedola, on July 25 along side six others when the lift (elevator) in which they were being taken down was tampered with.

Two accused persons (names withheld), who are maintenance staff of African Petroleum, AP, have been arrested in connection with the attempted murder and  are currently in Police custody.

The billionaire in company of two directors and four of his security details were trapped at the first floor of the executive lift of AP Plaza in Lagos Island, on his way to attend an emergency meeting of AP’s board.

Vanguard learnt that Otedola was earlier told to either suspend or sack one of the directors who oversees the finance of the organisation. He objected to that proposition on the ground that it should be discussed in the board room.

However, on his way to the emergency meeting with two of AP directors, Mr. Segun Senbanjo, Mr. Chris Adeyemi and four of his security details, they were trapped in the lift for over two hours.

While briefing newsmen in Abuja on the development yesterday, Deputy Inspector-General of Police in charge ‘D’ Department, John Ahmadu, who represented the IG, Ogbonna Onovo said: “But for timely intervention, the incident would have been tragic.”

Sources told Vanguard that during the time they were trapped, Otedola felt highly discomforted and was given first aid treatment.

Investigation showed that the elevator was installed by OTIS in 2009 and was being managed by same organization, hence ruling out old age or mismanagement leading the Lagos state police command to suspect foul play as crucial decisions were to be taken at the meeting.

Said DIG Ahmadu, “The case was initially investigated by the Lagos state Police command but when it was discovered that the case began to generate a lot of diverse interest which was also tilting towards an unpalatable angle, the IG decided to intervene”.

He ordered that the case be transferred to the force headquarters and detailed the Special Investigation Department headed by Commissioner of Police Ali Amodu to take over for diligent and discreet investigation of the case.

During investigation, three technical elevator engineers from OTIS were invited to carry out professional analysis of the elevators and they submitted their reports on the possible cause of the accident that culminated in the trapping of the Chairman of African Petroleum and six others.

“After submissions of the reports, police discovered that it was obvious that the elevator was tampered with, it was discovered that the safety control switch was pressed down, giving room that mischief makers may have tampered with the control-switch, knowing fully well that the chairman was inside the elevator. The report disclosed that it was amazing that immediately the switch board was properly placed the executive elevator started working.

It was also discovered that the elevator was on a 625 KVA generator, meaning that ordinarily, there was no room for NEPA electricity fluctuations.

Explaining that the maintenance unit of the plaza claimed that the lift was overloaded, the DIG said, investigation punctuated that argument saying, the mechanism would have alerted the victims and again the door would not have closed.