DUMO LULU-BRIGGS: A BELOVED SON PLAGUED BY THE SPIRIT OF ABSALOM

“The family is entangled in a succession and inheritance battle to determine who is the proper person to spearhead and ensure the permanency of the Chief O. B. Lulu-Briggs legacy. But history is replete with stories of how Kingdoms, communities and families go into long and arduous search for worthy successors to uphold the cherished legacies of forbearers and ancestors. King Saul was anointed because he was head and shoulder above his peers and King David was chosen because he had fought off lions from devouring the family herd. King Amachree was a warrior King that led his people to war against enemies...At the center of the crisis are the second son of the late High Chief O.B. Lulu-Briggs, Chief Dumo Lulu-Briggs, who is the incumbent chief of the family and the all-powerful widow of the late High Chief, Mrs. Seinye Lulu-Briggs.”

~Sotonye Ijuye,
Spokesman and Publicist for Dumo Lulu-Briggs as published on his Facebook page on 21 October at 9:57am as well as across other media platforms.
The raging crisis in the family of respected Nigerian statesman and renowned philanthropist, High Chief Dr. O. B. Lulu-Briggs is erroneously believed and being contrived by Dumo and his associates, as the above quote shows, as being between his wife, Dr. Mrs. Seinye O. B. Lulu-Briggs and his second son, Chief Dumo Lulu-Briggs. That narrative is not accurate. The crisis has always been between Dumo and his father over Dumo’s scheming and hostile attempts to take possession of his father’s wealth in his lifetime. His stepmother, Mrs Seinye Lulu-Briggs’ only concern at this time is the unnecessary delay by Dumo of the burial of their patriarch’s earthly remains. This is the crux of her public and private entreaties to him, personally and through other intervening mediators on the issue.

Ordinarily, the common ambition of sons to continue their father’s legacies is a worthy one. However, when greed and ambition drive them to rebel against the very object of their admiration, it becomes the cause of great anguish and distress for their families and communities. Invariable their efforts fail.

The long and bitter historic public battle between Dumo and his father dates back to the late 1990s. It is a battle that is both reminiscent and reflective of the biblical narrative of the life of Absalom, the son of King David who, like Dumo, also sought, but failed, to overthrow his father as King.

The biblical description of Absalom states that he was his father, King David’s favourite son, even though he was not his first son just like Dumo. Dumo is actually High Chief Lulu-Briggs’ second son. His charming ways, salacious tongue, personal brilliance and attractiveness; his love of magnificence, and royal courtesies captured the hearts of the people, in the same vein as it is with Dumo.

THE LAVISH AND OBSCURE LIFESTYLE OF THE MOST BELOVED SON

The bible says that Absalom lived lavishly, drove in a magnificent chariot, and had fifty men on his convoy. Despite this outward show of leadership, very little was known about Absalom’s own family life. Perhaps, you too are now wondering if there could be a better model mirroring Chief Dumo Lulu-Briggs’ lifestyle, right?

Does Dumo have a personal family life? Who has ever received an invitation from Chief and Mrs Dumo Lulu-Briggs for a housewarming party, a birthday party or a naming ceremony or graduation? Has anyone ever received any invitation from him for a ceremony involving any of his siblings, like his sisters’ engagement parties, wedding invitations, his father’s birthdays or even his father’s marriages? Not to mention the numerous other events associated with his father’s active social life?

THE GRAND USURPATION BY THE MOST BELOVED SON

Absalom killed his elder brother, Ammon. Similarly, Dumo appears to have extinguished the light of his elder brother Senibo. According to the Kalabari custom, that Dumo is upholding, it is the first son’s responsibility to buy his demised father’s coffin. However, at a recent Oruwari Briggs compound meeting, in the presence of all the chiefs and compound members, Chief Dumo was said to have publicly announced that at the risk of “being braggadocios,” he had “bought the most costliest casket in the world” to bury his father. A clear violation of Kalabari tradition, going by his high regard and demands on tradition against his stepmother.

After pleas from Joab and others, Absalom was forgiven by his father. In the case of Dumo, Kings, Chiefs and Clergy pleaded with the High Chief, and he too was forgiven for publicly humiliating and nearly shocking his father to death. Absalom was so anxious to be King that he allowed the pulsating rage of his vaunting ambition to guide his actions when he came back to his father’s Kingdom. He conspired against his father, behind his back, and without fully disclosing to his own associates what his real intentions were. Eventually he showed his hand, waging a bitter war against his father. Interestingly, Absalom failed in spite of crowning himself King. In the same vain Dumo was impatient with a father who loved him so dearly but apparently refused to, or was too slow to die.

The story of Absalom and his father King David has so many parallels to that of Dumo and his father High Chief O. B. Lulu-Briggs.

It is an open secret that like Absalom, Dumo was his father’s favourite son. And like Absalom, in 1998 after being employed into Moni Pulo Limited by his father, Dumo plotted to take over the oil company, behind his father’s back. Having perfected his plans, in 2002/2003 he made his moves. First, he sent letters out to the company’s key stakeholders introducing a purported new management formed by him, and casting aspersions on his father’s.

Next, in the company of a group of people who had been dismissed from the company, Chief Dumo physically led thugs and forcefully took over the company’s then Lagos office on 18 Festival Road in Victoria Island, Lagos.

THE PLOT TO DISPLACE THE FATHER

In a letter dated 26 August 2002 written to the Commissioner of Police, Rivers State Command referring to the siege, High Chief O. B. Lulu-Briggs stated that, “The said Dumo is one of my sons now occupying my office together with other dismissed staff and has threatened to shoot me if I continue to demand from him my Naira investments in banks (which he fraudulently withdrew without my knowledge or consent) and other company documents in his possession.

“In his bid to humiliate and shock me to death and make me beg for food from him, he fraudulently wrote to my bankers in London making himself and his cohorts… (names, including that of a current Bank Managing Director, withheld for now)…signatories to my company account with intention to liquidate the account,” High Chief lamented.

High Chief revealed, “I employed him in my company in 1998,” but regretted that “…he has since then tried to scheme and strip me of all powers and all funds and of my life.” He sought the then Commissioner of Police’s help, “I am appealing to you to intervene and save my life, my family and property and the life of my staff.”

Even though Dumo’s efforts were gallantly thwarted by his father. He did not relent.

In 2003, under the fraudulent guise of being a Director and shareholder of Moni Pulo Limited, in order to perfect his ambitious scheme, Dumo sought to conceal, regularize and formalize his fraudulent actions by filing suit FHC/ABJ/09/548/2003, at the Federal High Court, Abuja. Through it he sought an order of mandatory injunction compelling the Corporate Affairs Commission “to accept for filing and registration all the resolutions” of Moni Pulo Limited passed at its purported and fake Extra Ordinary General Meeting of August 15, 2003.

When he failed, once again Dumo dragged his father to the Federal High Court, this time in Lagos, and yes you guessed right- on behalf of Moni Pulo Limited. He sought to remove High Chief Lulu-Briggs from the ownership and management of his own company, maintaining that it was a family business that he falsely alleged his father was mismanaging.

As part of the suit, FHC/L/CS/1156/03 Dumo stated that:

An Extra-Ordinary General Meeting on the August 15, 2003 had purportedly removed his father as a director and chairman of the company and appointed himself, Director and Managing Director/ Chief Executive Officer of the company. So just like Absalom, he dethroned his ‘biological’ father and placed himself at the helm of Moni Pulo Limited.

Going further, he sought an order of court to compel his father “to surrender all the company’s chattels and properties in his possession including but not limited to BANK DOCUMENTS, CHEQUE BOOKS AND VEHICLES.” He also sought injunctions restraining his father or anyone associated with him from among other things “WITHDRAWING OR ASSERTING CONTROL OVER ANY OF THE FUNDS of the company maintained in banks within and outside Nigeria” and “from acting or parading himself or continuing to act or parade himself as director or Chairman of plaintiff” being Moni Pulo Limited.

THE GREAT LOVE OF A FATHER

The scandalous battle raged on until High Chief O. B. Lulu-Briggs was compelled to enter into a settlement agreement with Dumo through which Chief bought Dumo’s purported shares back for Moni Pulo Limited. All was forgiven and there was a truce for some time as his father continuously prayed and hoped that his dear son would repent. This, of course, brings to mind King David’s anguish after Absalom murdered his elder brother Ammon in broad daylight and ran away to his mother’s people. The loving father eventually sent for Absalom after three years. Two years later they reconciled.

However, in the case of Dumo and his father the respite was short lived. Dumo struck again in 2004. This time representing his two brothers, Senibo and Sofiri, who he had implicated in his initial scheme and fraudulently assigned Moni Pulo Shares and appointed as Chairman and Director respectively.

THE PLOT THICKENS

True to character, Dumo used the law and courts recklessly. This time, charging High Chief Dr. O.B. Lulu-Briggs in London and Houston. Once again, his father was forced to the negotiating table. Once again, he parted with money. Once again, he forgave his Dumo, his Senibo and his Sofiri. But their relationships with their father were strained and remained so until his passing.

However, just like Absalom, Dumo’s scheming continued. He stayed close and kept a tab on goings on in his father’s home. Like clockwork he would strategically turn up and take photographs with his father, usually at the end of gatherings where his father was being honoured, birthdays, and even whenever his father required hospital care. This explains why he would visit and take a photograph of his father who had just emerged from a coma and post it on social media and publish it across other media platforms in a bid to prove that he was not estranged from him and they had a close relationship.

THE CONSPIRACY AGAINST A WIDOW

Today, the impression is being given that Dr. (Mrs.) Seinye O. B. Lulu-Briggs is the problem. Dumo has called her all sorts of unprintable names, personally and through his acolytes. Dumo has made disrespectful references to the matriarch of the O.B. Lulu-Briggs family and its other children, his siblings. He has recklessly accused her of killing her beloved husband although he has all material facts contradicting his claims about his father’s demise. He uses his father’s body privately as a bargaining chip with his stepmother for the possession of his father’s estate, while he blackmails her in public to surrender the phantom assets belonging to his father he believes she is in possession of, as he told her he would do, right in front his own pastor.

A RELENTLESS PURSUIT OF THE ABSURD AND IMPENDING DOOM

Just as Absalom pursued his father with his last breath, Dumo is relentlessly pursuing his father, even in death. He has dragged his father’s body to be dissected in the name of autopsy, without cause.

The autopsy has been done but the report is pending. The preliminary results indicate that Dumo’s father died of cardiac arrest. Yet, he wants his father’s body to be brought out and dissected again through another autopsy. In the meantime, the two pathologists that represented him in the July 19, 2019 autopsy, Dr. Francis Adedayo Faduyile, the current President of the Nigerian Medical Association, who was flown to Ghana for the exercise, and renowned Ghanaian pathologist Professor Agyeman Akosa observed the autopsy and have not disputed its preliminary findings to this very day. Can someone please ask Dumo what he is looking for?

Chief Dumo Lulu-Briggs can put a stop to the wicked public spectacle he is subjecting his family to now and save himself the divine consequence that followed the case of Absalom whose spirit appears to drive his actions. While King David and High Chief both forgave their sons in spite of all they did to them, Absalom’s insistence in pursuing the despicable was his ultimate ruin.

High Chief (Dr.) O.B. Lulu-Briggs’ in his Will has directed that he wishes to be buried and for his funeral services to be simple and done in the Kalabari tradition, as allowed by his Christian beliefs. May God grant his solemn wishes.

Oraye St. Franklyn
Spokesman, Dr. Mrs. Seinye Lulu-Briggs

I have been following your write up about dumo and his drama, it has been expository. It's like madam seinye is fighting dirty this time. Dumo just met his match . Pls do madam have any child for high-chief Briggs ?

amaham:
I have been following your write up about dumo and his drama, it has been expository. It's like madam seinye is fighting dirty this time. Dumo just met his match . Pls do madam have any child for high-chief Briggs ?

No She doesn’t, her children are foster kids to the High Chief except the youngest one adopted by both of them in 2008.

FirstPostNig:
DUMO LULU-BRIGGS: A BELOVED SON PLAGUED BY THE SPIRIT OF ABSALOM

“The family is entangled in a succession and inheritance battle to determine who is the proper person to spearhead and ensure the permanency of the Chief O. B. Lulu-Briggs legacy. But history is replete with stories of how Kingdoms, communities and families go into long and arduous search for worthy successors to uphold the cherished legacies of forbearers and ancestors. King Saul was anointed because he was head and shoulder above his peers and King David was chosen because he had fought off lions from devouring the family herd. King Amachree was a warrior King that led his people to war against enemies...At the center of the crisis are the second son of the late High Chief O.B. Lulu-Briggs, Chief Dumo Lulu-Briggs, who is the incumbent chief of the family and the all-powerful widow of the late High Chief, Mrs. Seinye Lulu-Briggs.”

~Sotonye Ijuye,
Spokesman and Publicist for Dumo Lulu-Briggs as published on his Facebook page on 21 October at 9:57am as well as across other media platforms.
The raging crisis in the family of respected Nigerian statesman and renowned philanthropist, High Chief Dr. O. B. Lulu-Briggs is erroneously believed and being contrived by Dumo and his associates, as the above quote shows, as being between his wife, Dr. Mrs. Seinye O. B. Lulu-Briggs and his second son, Chief Dumo Lulu-Briggs. That narrative is not accurate. The crisis has always been between Dumo and his father over Dumo’s scheming and hostile attempts to take possession of his father’s wealth in his lifetime. His stepmother, Mrs Seinye Lulu-Briggs’ only concern at this time is the unnecessary delay by Dumo of the burial of their patriarch’s earthly remains. This is the crux of her public and private entreaties to him, personally and through other intervening mediators on the issue.

Ordinarily, the common ambition of sons to continue their father’s legacies is a worthy one. However, when greed and ambition drive them to rebel against the very object of their admiration, it becomes the cause of great anguish and distress for their families and communities. Invariable their efforts fail.

The long and bitter historic public battle between Dumo and his father dates back to the late 1990s. It is a battle that is both reminiscent and reflective of the biblical narrative of the life of Absalom, the son of King David who, like Dumo, also sought, but failed, to overthrow his father as King.

The biblical description of Absalom states that he was his father, King David’s favourite son, even though he was not his first son just like Dumo. Dumo is actually High Chief Lulu-Briggs’ second son. His charming ways, salacious tongue, personal brilliance and attractiveness; his love of magnificence, and royal courtesies captured the hearts of the people, in the same vein as it is with Dumo.

THE LAVISH AND OBSCURE LIFESTYLE OF THE MOST BELOVED SON

The bible says that Absalom lived lavishly, drove in a magnificent chariot, and had fifty men on his convoy. Despite this outward show of leadership, very little was known about Absalom’s own family life. Perhaps, you too are now wondering if there could be a better model mirroring Chief Dumo Lulu-Briggs’ lifestyle, right?

Does Dumo have a personal family life? Who has ever received an invitation from Chief and Mrs Dumo Lulu-Briggs for a housewarming party, a birthday party or a naming ceremony or graduation? Has anyone ever received any invitation from him for a ceremony involving any of his siblings, like his sisters’ engagement parties, wedding invitations, his father’s birthdays or even his father’s marriages? Not to mention the numerous other events associated with his father’s active social life?

THE GRAND USURPATION BY THE MOST BELOVED SON

Absalom killed his elder brother, Ammon. Similarly, Dumo appears to have extinguished the light of his elder brother Senibo. According to the Kalabari custom, that Dumo is upholding, it is the first son’s responsibility to buy his demised father’s coffin. However, at a recent Oruwari Briggs compound meeting, in the presence of all the chiefs and compound members, Chief Dumo was said to have publicly announced that at the risk of “being braggadocios,” he had “bought the most costliest casket in the world” to bury his father. A clear violation of Kalabari tradition, going by his high regard and demands on tradition against his stepmother.

After pleas from Joab and others, Absalom was forgiven by his father. In the case of Dumo, Kings, Chiefs and Clergy pleaded with the High Chief, and he too was forgiven for publicly humiliating and nearly shocking his father to death. Absalom was so anxious to be King that he allowed the pulsating rage of his vaunting ambition to guide his actions when he came back to his father’s Kingdom. He conspired against his father, behind his back, and without fully disclosing to his own associates what his real intentions were. Eventually he showed his hand, waging a bitter war against his father. Interestingly, Absalom failed in spite of crowning himself King. In the same vain Dumo was impatient with a father who loved him so dearly but apparently refused to, or was too slow to die.

The story of Absalom and his father King David has so many parallels to that of Dumo and his father High Chief O. B. Lulu-Briggs.

It is an open secret that like Absalom, Dumo was his father’s favourite son. And like Absalom, in 1998 after being employed into Moni Pulo Limited by his father, Dumo plotted to take over the oil company, behind his father’s back. Having perfected his plans, in 2002/2003 he made his moves. First, he sent letters out to the company’s key stakeholders introducing a purported new management formed by him, and casting aspersions on his father’s.

Next, in the company of a group of people who had been dismissed from the company, Chief Dumo physically led thugs and forcefully took over the company’s then Lagos office on 18 Festival Road in Victoria Island, Lagos.

THE PLOT TO DISPLACE THE FATHER

In a letter dated 26 August 2002 written to the Commissioner of Police, Rivers State Command referring to the siege, High Chief O. B. Lulu-Briggs stated that, “The said Dumo is one of my sons now occupying my office together with other dismissed staff and has threatened to shoot me if I continue to demand from him my Naira investments in banks (which he fraudulently withdrew without my knowledge or consent) and other company documents in his possession.

“In his bid to humiliate and shock me to death and make me beg for food from him, he fraudulently wrote to my bankers in London making himself and his cohorts… (names, including that of a current Bank Managing Director, withheld for now)…signatories to my company account with intention to liquidate the account,” High Chief lamented.

High Chief revealed, “I employed him in my company in 1998,” but regretted that “…he has since then tried to scheme and strip me of all powers and all funds and of my life.” He sought the then Commissioner of Police’s help, “I am appealing to you to intervene and save my life, my family and property and the life of my staff.”

Even though Dumo’s efforts were gallantly thwarted by his father. He did not relent.

In 2003, under the fraudulent guise of being a Director and shareholder of Moni Pulo Limited, in order to perfect his ambitious scheme, Dumo sought to conceal, regularize and formalize his fraudulent actions by filing suit FHC/ABJ/09/548/2003, at the Federal High Court, Abuja. Through it he sought an order of mandatory injunction compelling the Corporate Affairs Commission “to accept for filing and registration all the resolutions” of Moni Pulo Limited passed at its purported and fake Extra Ordinary General Meeting of August 15, 2003.

When he failed, once again Dumo dragged his father to the Federal High Court, this time in Lagos, and yes you guessed right- on behalf of Moni Pulo Limited. He sought to remove High Chief Lulu-Briggs from the ownership and management of his own company, maintaining that it was a family business that he falsely alleged his father was mismanaging.

As part of the suit, FHC/L/CS/1156/03 Dumo stated that:

An Extra-Ordinary General Meeting on the August 15, 2003 had purportedly removed his father as a director and chairman of the company and appointed himself, Director and Managing Director/ Chief Executive Officer of the company. So just like Absalom, he dethroned his ‘biological’ father and placed himself at the helm of Moni Pulo Limited.

Going further, he sought an order of court to compel his father “to surrender all the company’s chattels and properties in his possession including but not limited to BANK DOCUMENTS, CHEQUE BOOKS AND VEHICLES.” He also sought injunctions restraining his father or anyone associated with him from among other things “WITHDRAWING OR ASSERTING CONTROL OVER ANY OF THE FUNDS of the company maintained in banks within and outside Nigeria” and “from acting or parading himself or continuing to act or parade himself as director or Chairman of plaintiff” being Moni Pulo Limited.

THE GREAT LOVE OF A FATHER

The scandalous battle raged on until High Chief O. B. Lulu-Briggs was compelled to enter into a settlement agreement with Dumo through which Chief bought Dumo’s purported shares back for Moni Pulo Limited. All was forgiven and there was a truce for some time as his father continuously prayed and hoped that his dear son would repent. This, of course, brings to mind King David’s anguish after Absalom murdered his elder brother Ammon in broad daylight and ran away to his mother’s people. The loving father eventually sent for Absalom after three years. Two years later they reconciled.

However, in the case of Dumo and his father the respite was short lived. Dumo struck again in 2004. This time representing his two brothers, Senibo and Sofiri, who he had implicated in his initial scheme and fraudulently assigned Moni Pulo Shares and appointed as Chairman and Director respectively.

THE PLOT THICKENS

True to character, Dumo used the law and courts recklessly. This time, charging High Chief Dr. O.B. Lulu-Briggs in London and Houston. Once again, his father was forced to the negotiating table. Once again, he parted with money. Once again, he forgave his Dumo, his Senibo and his Sofiri. But their relationships with their father were strained and remained so until his passing.

However, just like Absalom, Dumo’s scheming continued. He stayed close and kept a tab on goings on in his father’s home. Like clockwork he would strategically turn up and take photographs with his father, usually at the end of gatherings where his father was being honoured, birthdays, and even whenever his father required hospital care. This explains why he would visit and take a photograph of his father who had just emerged from a coma and post it on social media and publish it across other media platforms in a bid to prove that he was not estranged from him and they had a close relationship.

THE CONSPIRACY AGAINST A WIDOW

Today, the impression is being given that Dr. (Mrs.) Seinye O. B. Lulu-Briggs is the problem. Dumo has called her all sorts of unprintable names, personally and through his acolytes. Dumo has made disrespectful references to the matriarch of the O.B. Lulu-Briggs family and its other children, his siblings. He has recklessly accused her of killing her beloved husband although he has all material facts contradicting his claims about his father’s demise. He uses his father’s body privately as a bargaining chip with his stepmother for the possession of his father’s estate, while he blackmails her in public to surrender the phantom assets belonging to his father he believes she is in possession of, as he told her he would do, right in front his own pastor.

A RELENTLESS PURSUIT OF THE ABSURD AND IMPENDING DOOM

Just as Absalom pursued his father with his last breath, Dumo is relentlessly pursuing his father, even in death. He has dragged his father’s body to be dissected in the name of autopsy, without cause.

The autopsy has been done but the report is pending. The preliminary results indicate that Dumo’s father died of cardiac arrest. Yet, he wants his father’s body to be brought out and dissected again through another autopsy. In the meantime, the two pathologists that represented him in the July 19, 2019 autopsy, Dr. Francis Adedayo Faduyile, the current President of the Nigerian Medical Association, who was flown to Ghana for the exercise, and renowned Ghanaian pathologist Professor Agyeman Akosa observed the autopsy and have not disputed its preliminary findings to this very day. Can someone please ask Dumo what he is looking for?

Chief Dumo Lulu-Briggs can put a stop to the wicked public spectacle he is subjecting his family to now and save himself the divine consequence that followed the case of Absalom whose spirit appears to drive his actions. While King David and High Chief both forgave their sons in spite of all they did to them, Absalom’s insistence in pursuing the despicable was his ultimate ruin.

High Chief (Dr.) O.B. Lulu-Briggs’ in his Will has directed that he wishes to be buried and for his funeral services to be simple and done in the Kalabari tradition, as allowed by his Christian beliefs. May God grant his solemn wishes.

Oraye St. Franklyn
Spokesman, Dr. Mrs. Seinye Lulu-Briggs

This appears to be a one-sided story.