A day of love and sharing turned tragic yesterday as a former reporter with African Independent Television (AIT) , Mr. Efenji Efenji, was hacked to death by suspected assailants.
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The tragic event happened at a popular outdoor joint: Corteland Garden and Bar, Karu, an outskirt of Federal Capital Territory, FCT, when a group of about 15 machete and axe-wielding youths attacked him and leaving him to bleed to death.
Efenji's relative, simply known as Innocent , alongside his wife and their nine-month-old baby boy as well as his own wife and baby had gone out in the spirit of the day to relax and share moments together.
Innocent disclosed that at a time in the garden, the whole place became rowdy with bottles being broken by some youths and they had to relocate to somewhere else in the area.
He said no sooner had they relocated to a corner in the garden before they found out that the deceased was not with them.
He said frantic efforts were quickly made to locate his whereabouts, but later saw him being cudgeled and cutlassed by over 15 hoodlums.
Innocent said he attacked the armed youths but was floored while the late Efenji was calling on him not to allow them kill him.
A visibly pained and angry Innocent said it was when he was down that the police arrived and arrested him despite his protestations that he was a relative of somebody that was attacked and that the police should accompany him to look for the whereabouts’ of the mortally wounded Efenji.
Despite his appeals, Innocent lamented that police did not heed as he was bundled off together with the manager of the Corteland Garden to the Karu Divisional Police Station at about 11: 00pm.
“I am angry with the police. Perhaps my brother Efenji would still be alive today if they had listened to me. No! They just hurled me into their van, removed my belt and locked me up. What sort of police do we have?, ” he asked rhetorically.
According to him, he later learnt that Efenji had scaled the barbed wire behind the garden despite being bloodied and collapsed a few meters from the Karu market apparently from loss of blood where his body was later found at about 4: 00 am upon a call from family members that were frantically looking for him.
When THISDAY visited the Corteland Garden, blood stains were on a trail leading to where the late journalist managed to scale the barbed wire fence to escape his assailants.
All attempts to get workers at the garden to comment on the tragic occurrence of February 14 proved abortive as none of them was willing to provide an insight to what happened that fateful night.
At the Karu Police station, the Area Commander of Abuja Metro, Mr. Sunday Odukoya who rushed ro the police station when he heard the unfortunate incident, said the police would brief the press when they have concluded investigation into the matter, disclosing that the manager of the garden and two suspects have been taken into custody.
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