Benin City – Tension and anger reigned supreme yesterday at Useh Community, Ogida Quarters, following the reported disappearance of a 24-year-old man, Mr. Uyi Ugiagbe from the area under mysterious circumstances.
Anxious residents who spoke to our Correspondent amid condemnation of the terrible occurrences in the Ugiagbe’s family blamed it on the mutual disagreements among the contending interests in the polygamous family which had unsettled it since the death of their father, Mr. Paul Ugiagbe over a year ago.
They explained that the first son of the Mr. Paul Ugiagbe (now deceased), Mr. Endurance Ugiagbe had been killed by unknown gunmen suspected to have been paid to eliminate him by his envious half brothers over his favourable share from their late father’s property as custom demands.
According to them, Uyi Ugiagbe may have been abducted or slain by the same suspected paid agents as he had been receiving threats to his life that he would be the next to be killed as they did to his late brother, Endurance.
Speaking also, a middle-aged man who simply identified himself as Mr. Emmanuel Osafanmen, alleged that some armed men had stormed Uyi’s home last week, demanding to see Uyi from his mother, Mrs. Adesuwa Ugiagbe who immediately collapsed at the sight of the dangerous weapons the suspected assailants wielded.
“Uyi was fortunate that day to have been able to escape through the back door of their apartment during the invasion before scaling the fence to an adjourning compound.
“After that invasion, Uyi apparently sure of where his troubles were coming from, sought to return all the properties that had been shared to his late brother from his father’s inheritance, but this step was thwarted by his mother who insisted that such a move was against the Benin custom and tradition”.
Another eye witness who craved for anonymity, said the present confusion in the area was caused by the disappearance of of Mr. Uyi, two days after he left his house after he received a phone call from an unknown caller and had promised to return home that same evening.
“I waited to hear his knock on the front door all through the night two days ago, all to no avail.
“I tried to reach him on his cell phone, it was not going through”, Uyi’s mother said.
Asked if the case had been reported to the police, the residents who seemed to have lost confidence in the police’s ability to investigate a crime thoroughly said, before Uyi’s disappearance, had reported the alleged threats to his life to police in Benin with no arrest or invitation of the suspects by the police.
Although no one can foresee the exact sequence of future events, but the litany of errors in police investigations have left the distraught widow, Mrs. Adesuwa Ugiagbe who bears the heaviest burden over the whereabouts of her beloved son, Uyi Ugiagbe in the shadows.
