Outrage As Lagos Armed Robbers Kill Winner Of IBM Competition, David Ntekim-Rex

Nigerians have taken to social media to lament over the death of a 22-year-old Computer Systems Engineer, David Ntekim-Rex, who was shot dead by armed robbers in the Jibowu area of Lagos State.

A relative of the deceased, who tweeted with the handle, Roy Mustang @Magnanimous_, said the police failed to help Ntekim-Rex when he was shot on Friday night while returning home.

He alleged that police were alerted after the robbery attack, but they came, took pictures and watched as Ntekim-Rex gasped for air.

Roy Mustang alleged that the police more more concerned with why he was carrying a laptop. instead of issuing a police report that would make hospitals accept him.

Even after Ntekim-Rex was rushed to the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH), the doctors refused to take any action and continued to cause unnecessary delays until they later pronounced Ntekim-Rex him dead on arrival.

“My ‘auntie’ has three sons. She’s always crazy about them. The middle child, David, is the most promising. He is a tech guy; very young, very brilliant. David was on his way home on Friday night when he was robbed, shot and killed around Jibowu. Please say a prayer for my aunt.

“David got shot around 8 pm. The police were called, David hadn’t died yet. The Nigerian police took pictures instead and were more concerned with why he, a tech guy, was carrying a laptop. Nigeria failed you, David.

“David was taken to the military hospital around the area. It took a senior nurse to come out and start checking for a pulse. He had lost a lot of blood at this point.

“The police then took David and his family to Sabo (police station), where they looked for the laptop that he had on him instead of giving them a police report. He was finally released to his family, and they got to LUTH around 12.30 am.

“He was there till the family was convinced he couldn’t be alive because he had no pulse. The country failed David. The doctors failed David. The police failed David. The system failed David. Rest in peace David Ntekim-Rex,” Roy Mustang tweeted.

Before his death, David in 2018, as a computer engineering student at the University of Lagos, emerged second in the annual “Master the Mainframe” competition, organized by AngelHack, a global hackathon company and the IBM Z Academic Initiative.

According to a 2018 statement by IBM, Ntekim-Rex had beaten 17,000 others from around the world, including finalists from Brazil, Germany, India, Japan, Nepal, and the United States to emerge as the co-regional winner of the Master the Mainframe competition.

The deceased, who was described as a tech guru by friends, bagged several certificates and accomplishments before graduating from the Department of Systems Engineering at the University of Lagos in 2019.

He was working as a Product Designer at a Financial Technology firm, Crevatal, before his demise, according to his LinkedIn profile.

David’s death has triggered outrage on Twitter, with many Nigerians attacking the attitude of police to gunshot victims and the indifference of doctors, who are expected to provide medicare.

Nigerians also condemned the system that allowed David, a young man with promising future to die, and some were of the view that Nigeria is not the right place for any young man that nurses a brighter future.

KanyiDaily had also reported how a young man died on Sunday after he was denied treatment by the Isolo General Hospital in Lagos State over fear of coronavirus.