BY AGNES NWORIE, ABAKALIKI
A 30-year-old-labourer, who specialized in digging wells, simply identified as Sheu, has reportedly gotten suffocated to death while helping one of his customers to repair his well.
Sheu was said to have been hired by Madam Loyal, the caretaker managing house number 26, Obi Street, Abakaliki, Ebonyi State, to dig a well in her compound.
The victim was said to have been accompanied to the house for the work by three of his kinsmen who are also well diggers.
Narrating the incident, a resident of the area, Chimaobi Odom, said that Sheu, an indigene of Sokoto State resident in Ogbe Hausa in Abakaliki, died inside the well due to excessive heat.
According to Odom, one of the labourers who came to work with Sheu was the first to enter the well to start work on April 1, 2022. Curiously however, the man rushed out complaining that it was excessively hot at the bottom of the well. He advised the owner to leave the well open and postpone the work till the next day.
The following day, April 2, Sheu, who is known for hard work, reportedly arrived at the well ahead of his colleagues and entered the well to commence work without anyone to support him.
He was said to have gotten suffocated and died inside the well unnoticed until around 9am when his kinsmen came to join him. They, however, discovered that he had died inside the well.
Following this, other diggers and some occupants of the compound made efforts to bring the corpse out of the well.
A resident called Egenti Rosemary told The Point that when his corpse was eventually recovered, his colleagues took it to Ogbe Hausa Central Mosque for prayers before being buried in accordance with Islamic doctrine.
“When the Hausa men arrived at the scene of the incident with a bus to evacuate the corpse, they requested that the woman who hired the victim should join them. Based on the request, two of the woman’s daughters and a male relative of the caretaker went with them as she (the caretaker) was already in police custody.
”When they arrived at Ogbe Hausa Central Mosque and notified the leader of the Hausa community in Ebonyi State, Alhaji Danjuma Gambo, the people were asked to wait outside while the corpse was taken inside. Shortly after, they came out and freed the woman’s relatives to go home.”
The remains of the victim had since been buried just as the caretaker and the residents who were arrested by men of the Ekumenyi Police Division in connection with the incident, had been released on bail.
