The late Salem
Hit-and-run driver confesses to killing Vanguard Reporter, Tordue Salem
A 29-year-old hit-and-run commercial driver, Itoro Clement, has confessed to killing a journalist, Tordue Salem, of the Vanguard newspaper.
Salem who until his death was covering the House of Representatives went missing in the night of Oct.13, 2021, culminating in protest and agitation by members of the Nigerian Union of Journalists (NUJ) in Abuja.
Force Public Relations Officer, Frank Mba while parading the driver on Friday said that Clement was arrested following an investigation carried out by the Force Intelligence Bureau.
Mba said that Clement was driving a 2004 Model Camry with number plate BWR 243 BK at the time that he hit the journalist with his car, adding that he had confessed to hitting Tordue at about 10:00 pm on the night of 13th October 2021, around Mabushi area in Abuja but ran away.
The driver, during interrogation, said, “I thought it was an armed robber that I knocked down until the following day when I saw a smashed phone on my windscreen. The phone was not working again so I threw it away.”
He explained after hitting the journalist who he took for an armed robber, he sped off because the area where the incident occurred is notorious for criminal activities.
“The place I knocked this person down, is a criminal place everybody knows that place,” he said.
The police said they found the body of the deceased journalist, an indigene of Benue State, on Thursday, more than a month after he went missing.
