A 55-year-old widow, Jumoke Adeagbo, has sought the assistance of the Committee for Defence of Human Rights (CDHR) to recover the proceeds from her late husband’s property, which a family lawyer allegedly withheld in Ilorin, Kwara State.

The mother of six, who lost her husband on June 12, 2024, claimed that the Ilorin-based lawyer only paid her N16 million out of the total N25 million realised from the sale of two plots of land located at Budo-Osho in the state capital. She alleged that the property was sold without her consent after her husband’s death last year.

Speaking to newsmen in tears at the High Court in Ilorin, Adeagbo stated that the lawyer initially released N6 million and added another N10 million only after the Bureau of Lands intervened. She said she approached the CDHR when all efforts to resolve the matter with the lawyer proved unsuccessful.

“I have approached the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), but it yielded no result. I also sought the intervention of the Bureau of Lands, which helped to plead with him before he released N10 million, making it N16 million out of the N25 million he realised from selling my late husband’s property,” she explained.

Adeagbo lamented what she described as an unusual experience where “the guilty party took the innocent to court.” She alleged: “It was when I insisted that he must pay up the balance that he took us to court. It is to silence me because he once told me that by the time I spend my time and exhaust my resources, I will stop disturbing him.”

When contacted by phone, the accused lawyer, Issa Oladimeji Umar, said he was in court at Erinle. He later directed further inquiries to Mrs Adeagbo, saying: “The case is in court. Go to the woman; whatever she says is okay by me.”

Meanwhile, Justice Hammed Gegele of the Kwara State High Court has adjourned the matter to July 1 for further hearing. Apart from Mrs Adeagbo, the family lawyer (plaintiff), Umar, listed the state chairman and secretary of CDHR as second and third defendants in the case.