A 20-year-old Nigerian Folajimi Olubunmi-Adewole has lost his life trying to save a woman who fell from the London Bridge.
The young Nigerian popularly known as Jimi was on his way home from work on Saturday when he saw a woman fall off the bridge.
He and another man entered the water at around midnight in a bid to rescue her, but while the woman and the other man were rescued by the Coastguard and the Metropolitan Police’s Marine Unit, Jimi wasn’t found after an extensive search.
Jimi’s passage left his father, Michael Adewole, 63, and his mother, Olasunkanmi Adewole, 54, heartbroken.
Chairman of the Nigerians in Diaspora Commission Abike Dabiri-Erewa has condoled with the family of the deceased, described him as “our hero and a great martyr”.
In a statement on Tuesday by the commission’s head of media, Abdur-Rahman Balogun, the NIDCOM boss expressed deep pain over Jimi’s death, saying he would never be forgotten.
She passionately appealed to the family of Jimi to take heart and be consoled by the fact that he died as a fearless hero and would be forever remembered as a martyr.
Dabiri-Erewa prayed God to grant the deceased’s soul perfect peace and comfort his aged parents, family and friends in the best manner.
“This is a very painful and sad incident for a young promising Jimi to die this way, sacrificing his life,” she said in the statement.
“Undoubtedly, Jimi with this courageous and selfless act, has earned himself the sobriquet of a hero and attained the highest form of death; martyrdom,” she said.
The Mayor of London Sadiq Khan said in a tweet that Jimi “was the best of us.”
