While his body remains at the mortuary, the above riddle is at the center of the death of Haruna Shaibu at Obangede, Okehi Local Government of Kogi State. He was alleged to have committed suicide in the cell when he was in custody of the police there.
The family is, however, not convinced Haruna hung himself. Despite the overtures made to them by community leaders, council chairman and the clan chief, the family has refused to collect Haruna’s body which lies cold at the Obangede General Hospital.
According to Haruna’s brother,Ayodele Shaibu, otherwise known as Pastor Joseph Onono, who doubles as the family spokesman, the family is now being persecuted for refusing the overtures of community leaders to collect and bury his brother.
“The chairman of Okehi LG, Alhaji Ibrahim Adagu, gave us N10,000 and ordered us to collect the body. We refused because the police and other accomplices are yet to explain to us how my brother died. And for refusing to accept his body, thugs were sent after us. They invaded our house to disperse and harass us. I had to call the police before they allowed us to live in peace.”
Haruna’s journey to death began on September 17, 2010 when he was arrested on allegation of theft. In a petition to the Inspector General of Police, the lawyer described those who arrested Haruna as a group that is in charge of an “illegal security outfit ”. He was taken to Obangede Police Station and detained. Few days after his arrest, the police claimed the deceased committed suicide in their custody.
Onono told Daily Sun that until the circumstances surrounding the death of Haruna are established, he would not collect his brother’s body.
He hinged his assertion on allegation that his brother’s death must have arisen from police’s complicity with local politicians to use his corpse for ritual purposes. He also alleged that, the other man accused of the same offence and arrested along with his brother was released immediately after his family paid some money and wondered how anybody in police custody could have access to a belt which the police claimed the deceased used to hang himself.
He also faulted the picture of his brother that was shown to him and the narration of the police: “How would a hung person’s feet be on the ground instead of being suspended?”
The petition to the IGP bythe family’s lawyer said: “our client’s complaint is yet to be looked into namely, that a post-mortem examination be carried out to ascertain the cause of the death of the deceased...
The need for a post-mortem exercise becomes the more real as the medical officer in the General Hospital, Obangede who received the corpse of the deceased into the mortuary was baffled at noticing some blood stains on the make-shift stretcher. This is aside from the fact that the police building at Obangede is decked.”
The family’s solicitors therefore asked that a post-mortem be done to determine the real cause of death with a view to bringing to book anybody that might be involved in the death of the deceased.
