Former speaker of the House of Representatives, Dimeji Bankole, on Saturday tied the nuptial knot with Aisha Shinkafi Saidu, a stepdaughter of Kebbi State governor, Atiku Bagudu.
The wedding occurred in a low-key ceremony in Abuja almost four years after the former speaker divorced his first wife, Olaitan, in 2017.
Aisha, a law graduate of the University of Hull in the UK, is a granddaughter of the late former head of the Nigeria Security Organisation (NSO) and the Marafan Sokoto, Alhaji Umaru Shinkafi.
The bride’s mother is daughter to Shinkafi and a sister to the former Governor of Zamfara State, Alhaji Aliyu Shinkafi.
The Bankole family in Iporo, Abeokuta had earlier issued a statement disclosing that a quiet introduction had taken place between the two families as a prelude to the joining together of the new couple in line with Islamic and traditional injunctions.
At the introduction ceremony, the task of leading the groom’s family to that of the bride had fallen on the Governor of Sokoto State, Alhaji Aminu Tambuwal, Bankole’s immediate successor as the Speaker of the House of Representatives.
The Abuja wedding was said to have been designed to be low-key because of the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.
It was, however, observed that many of the guests at the ceremony failed to observe the COVID-19 protocols.
This was in spite of earlier appeal to all invited guests to observe all the health and safety measures directed by the National Centre for Disease Control (NCDC).
