The
shrill shout for help rented the quiet atmosphere in Ogombo village, Lekki,
Eti-Osa Local Government Area of Lagos State, at the early hours of Tuesday,
last week. Residents who were jolted from sleep felt reluctant at first to come
out, apparently thinking it was a robbery attack.
When
a man later discovered to be the landlord of the building where the shout
emanated from summoned courage to go see what the problem was, he was
reportedly taken aback, on seeing a young man in the pool of his blood, with a
kitchen knife by the side of his ribs.
The
dying man, Mr. Edet Ebong, a member of staff of the Akwa Ibom State Transport
Company, was reportedly rushed to a hospital within the vicinity by policemen
from Ogombo Division who were alerted by the landlord identified as Baba Dada.
Unfortunately, he was reportedly rejected. Thereafter, he was rushed to the
Marina General Hospital where doctors battled in vain to save his life.
As
you read this piece, Ebong is lying stone dead at the hospital morgue, no
thanks to his lover of 18 months. At the moment, his alleged killer, Miss
Blessing Edet, is cooling her heels at the State Criminal and Investigations
Department (SCIID), Yaba.
Crime Guard investigation revealed that the deceased moved into his
girlfriend’s apartment six months ago after he was ejected from his. The
relationship which had lasted for a year and six months was at its final stage
of being consummated into marriage when the unexpected occurred. It was
learned that the deceased returned home at about 11pm, without the slightest inkling
that it would be his last night on earth.
A
version of the account at Crime Guard’s disposal reveals that the
quarrel between the love birds was as a result of Blessing’s refusal to add
canned sardines in the noodles her live-in over asked her to prepare for him.
Account of eyewitnesses
A
resident who claimed to have witnessed the quarrel said: “I was waiting outside
for my boyfriend who was yet to come home when I saw Edet walk
in. Thereafter, I overheard Blessing saying she could not go out that
night to buy canned sardines to prepare the noodles.
At
about an hour and thirty minutes later, my boyfriend arrived and as we were
going into our apartment, I heard them shouting at the top of their voices,
with Blessing threatening to stab Edet with a knife if he laid his hands on
her. She apparently made good her threat soon after that.”
Another
resident who was accosted by this reporter claimed she never knew the suspect
as Blessing. Speaking sarcastically, the resident who simply gave her name as
Funmi said: “When she moved in here four months ago, she said her name was
Amaka, an Ibo lady. But we later discovered she was a commercial sex worker.
Later,
she started seeing the man (deceased ) regularly and before we knew it, he had
moved in with her. Three months ago, they had a quarrel, in the course of which
Blessing flung her boyfriends cloths out and ordered him to leave her
apartment. But we later saw him coming back again.
Had
he remained where he went, this would not have happened. We discovered that she
tried to manage the situation herself. Had she raised the alarm early, her
boyfriend would not have died. He died as a result of so much loss of blood”,
Funmi said.
Sex, cause of fight
In
an encounter with the Akwa-Ibom State-born suspect, she was full of remorse,
finding it difficult to accept she actually killed her lover. In an
emotion-laden tone, she said: “I never meant to kill him. Of all the men I have
come across, he appealed most to me. He came home that night drunk and
requested that I prepared noodles for him. After eating and we laid down to
sleep, he started making advances for sex.
I
politely told him that I was tired. At a point, he wanted to have it by force
but I stopped the move. He flared up and started beating me. He said he was
free to have me any time he wanted because we were going to get married. Unable
to control his emotion, he broke the standing mirror and used one of the broken
pieces to stab me in the eye.
“At
that point, I rushed into the kitchen and brought the knife I used to slice
onion for the noodles. I only wanted to threaten him with it. But before I knew
it, I mistakenly stabbed him in the stomach by the side of his left
ribs. “Honestly, I did not know the knife pierced into his stomach because
he kept chasing me around. He went under the bed and brought out a cutlass,
threatening to cut off my neck.
My
younger brother who lives with me did all he could to stop him. When he
discovered he couldn’t, he rushed out and started calling for help. It was at
this point I noticed that my lover was getting weak and fell down. On closer
look, I discovered he was bleeding profusely. When my landlord came, he called
in policemen from Ogombo Division.”
At
this point, she stopped talking and held her head with her two hands and
started pulling her hairs. Thereafter, she tilted back and forth and burst into
tears. Asked why she was crying, she said amid tears, “I have neither a mother
nor a father to cry to at the moment.
He
filled that vacuum. He promised me while the going was good that our children
would not be orphaned. I prayed like never before for his survival while he was
in the hospital. The worst has happened and I am crying because I don’t know
where I am going from here. I swear I stabbed him mistakenly,” she stressed ,
with an expression of guilt.
Source: Vanguard
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