The Speaker House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila; his deputy, Ahmed Wase, and the minority caucus of the House of Representatives, have expressed sadness over the death of the Vanguard’s reporter, Tordue Salem.
The police on Friday said Salem, who went missing on October 13, was found dead in a morgue of the General Hospital, Wuse, Abuja on Thursday.
The police also paraded one Clement Itoro, a commercial driver, who claimed he knocked down the deceased on the night he went missing because he took him for a thief.
There have been criticisms of both accounts by Nigerians, including the Deputy Senate President Ovie Omo-Agege, the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ) and Governor Samuel Ortom of Benue State.
The speaker, in a statement by his Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Lanre Lasisi, yesterday said it was more painful that, the vibrant and committed journalist went missing for almost a month before his corpse was discovered at a morgue in Abuja.
Wase, in a statement by his Chief Press Secretary, Umar Muhammad Puma, said the National Assembly would miss Tordue’s brand of journalism that had enriched lives of many Nigerians.
The House Minority Leader, Ndudi Elumelu, in a statement, said the news was shocking and devastating.
“The news of the reported discovery of the remains of the journalist on Thursday, a month after he went missing, is horrifying and yet another sad commentary on worsening insecurity in our country.”
The caucus urged the police to address all conflicting issues related to the disappearance and death of the journalist.
