Suspected assassins kill businesswoman in Ilorin, NTA reporter killed in Benin

Residents of Kulende area of Ilorin, Kwara State have been thrown into mourning following the killing of a young businesswoman simply known as Alhaja Rashidat.
Rashidat, who was operating a shop close  to her residence,  was  gunned down about  10 pm on Friday while preparing to close for the day.
A source said on Monday that the deceased was buried on Saturday according to Islamic rites amidst tears and wailing.
The assailants had arrived the shop located beside the Ilorin Centre of the National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) on a motorbike to perpetrate the act.
The source, who craved anonymity, said that as soon as the assailants trapped the deceased in her shop, they told her of their  intention.
The victim was said to have pleaded with the assailants  to spare her life, promising them  money.
The suspects, however, were said to have ignored her plea  and shot her before fleeing the scene.
The deceased had been a victim of several  robberies  in the area because of her thriving  business.
DSP Ajayi Okasanmi, the Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO) of Kwara State Police Command, confirmed the incident.
He said the  two assailants came on a motorcycle and shot the victim  dead in front of her shop at Kulende.
Okasanmi, however, said that some suspects had been arrested in connection with the incident.
He said  that the  suspects would soon be paraded alongside other suspected  cultists recently arrested in the state.
In a similar incident, a reporter with the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA), Benin, Edo State, Mr Lawrence Okojie, was allegedly shot dead by gunmen on Saturday night in Benin.
Okojie was reported to have been killed around Ogunola Junction, off Siluko Road.
Spokesman of the State Police Command, DSP Moses Nkombe, who confirmed the report, said one person had been arrested in connection with the incident.
The late Okojie, who was dropped off by NTA staff bus at Ogunola Junction around 8 p.m. on Saturday, had called his wife on phone and informed her that he was on his way home.
It was, however, several hours later that the wife, after repeated calls to his phone without any response raised an alarm that her husband, who was supposed to have arrived home could not be reached.
It was gathered that some of his colleagues at NTA, joined by some family members on a search mission, discovered his corpse in a morgue in Benin on Sunday night.
As at the time of filing in this report, the circumstances surrounding the death of the reporter are still sketchy.
The police have, however, promised to thoroughly investigate the matter.
Okojie’s death brings to five the number of journalists killed in the state in the last six years.