The first and surviving son of the late Major General Mamman Vatsa, Alhaji Haruna Vatsa, has died after a brief illness.
Until his death in Kaduna on Tuesday afternoon, the 49-year-old was Director-General Protocol to Governor Abubakar Bello of Niger state.
Chief Press Secretary to the Governor, Jibrin Ndace, confirmed the death in a statement released on Tuesday.
Survived by a wife, four children and a sister, Haruna will be buried by 10am on Wednesday at Waterworks (Safa Farm), Malali, Kaduna.
Haruna’s brother, Jibrin Mamman Jiya Vatsa, died in September 2015 in Calabar, Cross River State, after a brief illness.
The father of late Haruna, Major General Vatsa, was a senior army officer and poet who was executed by the government of Major General Ibrahim Babangida on March 5, 1986 following a military tribunal death sentence for treason associated with an abortive coup.
He served as Minister of the Federal Capital Abuja, and was a member of the Supreme Military Council.
Literary giants, Chinua Achebe, Wole Soyinka and JP Clark, pleaded with Babangida to spare Vatsa’s life but the head of state refused, insisting that the punishment for treason in the military is death.
