Naira scarcity: LASU official slumps, dies on bank queue

Johnson Adesola, an employee of the Lagos State University (LASU), has died while waiting on a queue to withdraw money at a bank on the institution’s main campus in Ojo.

TheCable understands that Adesola, identified as an official of the varsity’s bursary department, left his office for a branch of Wema Bank within the school premises to withdraw cash on Monday.

A few minutes after he joined a queue at the bank, he was said to have slumped and was thereafter taken to the varsity’s health centre where he was confirmed dead.

When contacted by TheCable on Tuesday, Olaniyi Jeariogbe, the university’s acting head of information and public relations unit, confirmed Adesola’s death.

“Yes, (it is true). Like you and I know, death is a natural call. It can come at any point in time for anyone of us. He (Adesola) was at the bank arena to get some cash for himself, not for the university, when that call (death) came,” Jeariogbe said.

“All efforts to revive him went unproductive. It wasn’t something that anybody was expecting to happen, it was unfortunate.”

Jeariogbe, however, dismissed claims that it was the institution’s bursar that passed away.

“We have not, as an institution, lost the deputy bursar or bursar. Our bursar, Saheed Babatunde Olayinka, is alive, hale, and hearty. The deputy bursar is also alive. We have about five deputy bursars in LASU and none of them is dead,” he added.

“The person affected is Johnson Ademola Adesola who, until his demise, was chief executive officer, accounts, in the bursary department. He was also the faculty finance officer, faculty of law, before the sudden incident.

“He joined the services of Lagos State University on January 10, 1986 as a typist II before he rose to become the chief executive officer, accounts.”

The development comes amid the queues and protests trailing the naira scarcity across the country.