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From Aloysius Attah, Onitsha
The death of one male and two female undergraduates recently in a private hostel located at Umudioka Awkuzu, along the road leading to Chukwuemeka Odumegwu Ojukwu University, Igbariam Campus, Anambra State, left many in shock.
The dead students, Michael Chidera Obidiaso, a 200-level student of Political Science Department; Mercy, a 200-level Pharmacy student, and Emmanuella, a 200-level Business Administration student, were discovered in a decomposing state by another student who went in search of Michael, having been calling his number for days without any response.
When the news broke, it was erroneously reported that three girls were found dead inside the hostel. It was also reported that the girls were locked inside the room from outside and that they were poisoned.
But when our reporter visited the hostel, more details emerged that the victims were one male and two females. One of the girls was actually a girlfriend to Michael.
An unusual silence pervaded the hostel named Goodluck, a two-storey building with several apartments, when the reporter entered the premises. Some of Michael’s personal belongings were in a corner of the building. It was learnt that they were abandoned after the bodies were evacuated from the room.
One of Michael’s coursemates, who also resided in the same hostel, told the reporter that he was the one that actually discovered their bodies before alerting others.
He said Michael had finished his second semester exams and would have proceeded to 300 level in the next academic session before the tragic incident.
The coursemate, who pleaded anonymity, said Michael, who hailed from Ihiala, Anambra State, went home earlier and returned a few days before the incident.
He said: “The last time I saw him alive was on Tuesday evening when I went to buy fuel. I saw him as he was going out and we greeted. When I was going home on Wednesday, I came and knocked at his door but he didn’t open or respond to my calls. I finally went home and came back on Thursday and decided to check on him.
“While I was at home, I had a kind of premonition and I reached out to his cousin, also a student, and informed him that Michael was neither picking his calls nor replying my text messages. When I came back that Thursday, I wanted to climb upstairs to go and rest but my mind told me to go and check on him again, since he was yet to respond to my calls.”
The coursemate said he went down to Michael’s room, knocked severally but no response came, while his phone also rang out repeatedly but he didn’t answer the phone.
“That was when I decided to check the backside of his room and when the silence persisted, I became really apprehensive. I then went through the kitchen window and called his name but still no response. On getting there, I perceived a foul odour. It was in the night and there was no light in the room but when I flashed my torchlight through the kitchen window, I saw a lady lying motionless on the floor.
“That was when I ran to our hostel’s president upstairs and narrated what I saw to him. All of us rushed downstairs, broke the door and were really jolted by what we saw: three decomposing dead bodies. We were confused and aghast over what we saw but we managed to raise alarm and other people around the vicinity joined us,” he explained.
He said they were really at a loss on what might have killed them, noting that those who suspected generator fumes may be wrong because the area had been enjoying steady power supply from the grid.
He said they first of all reported the incident to the campus anti-cult unit, who visited the scene that night and left, before involving the police, who came the next morning and evacuated the bodies.
“The incident was shocking and horrifying and I must say that, if not that I was moved to check on him, they would have decayed to such a horrifying level that people would not notice because everywhere was very scanty as students were not in school, having vacated after their exams,” he said.
A store owner in front of the hostel, Agnes, told the reporter that the vicinity was like a film theatre that day as many people surged to catch a glimpse of what happened when police came to evacuate the bodies.
Agnes, who confirmed that she knew Michael because he used to buy things from her, said they were also shocked over what happened.
Asked for her own view of what might have caused the death of the students, she said anything could happen within student’s hostels but only God knows what actually happened.
She said: “It is not within my power to speak ill of the dead but we see many things here, including the bad and the ugly. Many students live double-faced lives. They are angels at home but anything in school.
“If I say that 85 per cent of students living off campus are drug addicts, it may sound like generalisation or an overstatement, but we see them in their true colours here. Some female students smoke like a chimney, while their male lovers who goad them into such junkie lifestyle do the unthinkable.
“Some try dangerous sex styles after getting high on drugs, while others live reckless lives. Some of the girls wear little or nothing to cover their bodies while in school and they shamelessly flaunt themselves that way but anytime they want to visit home, they change into something decent.
“We had a case of a female student who was caught napping by her mother who paid her a surprise visit. The mum was in front of her hostel door and called her, telling her to come and pick her at Igbariam Junction. The girl ran back from her boyfriend’s room half nude and rushed to rearrange her room and change to decent clothes before going out to bring her mum but was surprised when she ran to her door in that state and met the mum standing there.
“The import of what happened over this unfortunate incident is a wake-up call for parents to be checking on their children often while they are in school. There is a saying that some parents can trace their lineage to the third generation with ease when asked to do so but they cannot explain where their daughter slept last night. The two girls that ended up this way were not sent to school to go and be sleeping in a male student’s hostel room. I also heard that one of the girls that died was the only daughter of her parents.”
Michael’s cousin, identified as Nelson, also a student of the university, told Daily Sun that the family was devastated over the unfortunate incident.
He disclosed that the three families whose children died in such unfortunate circumstances were now united in grief and have told the police that they were not disposed to further pressure but should be allowed to take their bodies for burial. But, according to him, the police are insisting that autopsy will be carried out, even as investigations continue.
On the substances suspected to be drugs reportedly recovered from the room where the bodies were discovered, the university’s public relations officer, Dr. Harrison Madumelu, when contacted, said it was only the police that could say exactly what they saw at the scene. He said the police were also expected to subject such substances to clinical examination with the appropriate authorities to ascertain the actual thing, if true.
Spokesman of the Anambra State Police Command, Ikenga Tochukwu, said investigation into the incident had commenced.
