A close friend of Anthony Joshua has said the boxer would be in a “traumatised situation” from seeing another friend die in a car crash, who was more like a “twin brother” to him.
Kolawole Omoboriowo, who has known the two-time world heavyweight champion for eight years, was the one to break the news to Anthony Joshua‘s family about the accident.
Joshua, the 36-year-old British-Nigerian boxer, was travelling in the back of a black SUV when it hit a stationary truck on major road near Lagos in Nigeria, killing two of his friends.
Mr Omoboriowo, who coordinates Joshua’s logistics in Nigeria, said the boxer’s family were “like my other family in the UK”.
The time since has been a “crazy nightmare for everyone”, he told Sky News on Wednesday.
When he got the news, Mr Omoboriowo instantly called Joshua’s mother, who is “like a mum to me”, he said.
But she did not pick up, so he then got through to a cousin, who herself called someone at the scene of the crash who confirmed what had happened.
“Everyone started panicking… and we started looking around, [wondering] ‘Who can we call? How do we know where they are?'”.
Friend was ‘like a twin brother’
He said Latif Ayodele, one of the two people killed in the accident, was “more than a friend” to Joshua and more like a “twin brother”.
“That is somebody you see him with every single time, that is his best friend, that is who he loves, he talks to, he takes advice from.”
A second close friend, Sina Ghami, was also killed in the collision.
“What is actually in my head now is: ‘How do we get AJ out of that traumatised situation?’. And that is just the only thing that everybody is worried about right now.”
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Joshua, who was born in Watford to Nigerian parents, was on holiday in Nigeria following his win over Jake Paul in Miami on December 19.
He survived with minor injuries, police have said, and is currently recovering in hospital.
Joshua is a ‘wonderful person around everyone’
Speaking to Sky News, Mr Omoboriowo said: “Right now, everybody might think AJ is okay”.
But, as the boxer has lost a close friend, “we don’t know how he’s gonna take it.”
“But right now we just want everybody to actually like give him a moment to actually relax, rest, and we pick it up from there.”
He added: “We just need to keep praying for AJ, for God to give him the strength to be able to carry on with these losses.”
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He described his friend Joshua as “a very wonderful person around everyone” who is “not that kind of person that really cares about the income, money or anything”.
Another friend of Joshua’s and his barber, Gbadia Figbeghawei, said he wished to God “don’t let this be true” when he first heard the news.
