President Muhammadu Buhari has commiserated with the family of the late Senator Olabiyi Durojaiye.
President Buhari, in a statement Tuesday by his spokesman, Femi Adesina, described the passing of the elder statesman as a great loss to the nation.
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The President also condoled with the government and people of Ogun State, as well as friends and political associates on the loss of the man he called “a dogged fighter for democracy, an activist, a nationalist and an indispensable member of the financial community.”
President Buhari noted that Durojaiye’s imprints were always visible where he worked as a director of the Central Bank of Nigeria, at the Mint, and as Chairman of Nigerian Communications Commission, stressing that he remained an epitome of professionalism, integrity, kindness and humility.
President Buhari, who said the late Senator Durojaiye’s commitment to democratic ideals was never in doubt, recalled the prominent roles he played as a member of NADECO in fighting for justice towards the actualisation of the memorable June 12 election.
The President, who prayed for the repose of the soul of the departed, urged the family to take solace in the fact that their patriarch lived a life of inspiration and impacted positively on the community and national landscapes.
Durojaiye who was a leading member of the pro-democracy group, NADECO, was also in the National Assembly between 1999 and 2003 on the platform of the Alliance for Democracy.
Meanwhile, the Ogun State Governor, Dapo Abiodun, and his Ekiti counterpart, Kayode Fayemi, have expressed shock over the death of the elder statesman.
Abiodun, in a statement on Tuesday by his Chief Press Secretary, Kunle Somorin, described him as a strong pillar of his administration.
He also described Durojaiye’s death as a great loss to the progressives, the political ideology he identified with and represented while alive.
He noted that the senator was a political giant whose politics was devoid of bitterness.
Fayemi, in a statement by his Chief Press Secretary, Yinka Oyebode, said he was saddened that a pillar in the struggle for the restoration of democracy in Nigeria in the nineties has gone.
The governor said the deceased was one of the prominent pro-democracy campaigners who gave younger elements in the movement like him the inspiration during the struggle for the revalidation of the June 12, 1993 presidential election.
By Muideen Olaniyi, Peter Moses, Abeokuta & Raphael Ogbonnaiye, Ado-Ekiti
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