The soul of Madam Grace Ola Orji Okoro of Igabara Edda, Afikpo South Local Government Area of Ebonyi State is yet to rest in peace following the disappearance of her corpse in Owutu Edda General Hospital mortuary where it was deposited preparatory for burial. Madam Orji Okoro, popularly known as Ezinne Nma Grace, died on 2nd July 2021 at the age of 80 and was deposited in Owutu Edda mortuary. Her burial was scheduled for 28th December 2021 with every arrangement made to ensure its success.
Family members, relatives, sympathizers, well-wishers and guests had seated waiting for her corpse to arrive from a mortuary. Grave had already been dug behind the woman husband’s compound in the Igbara Edda village for her burial with foods, drinks and other things prepared for guests packaged and kept to entertain the guests immediately her remains is committed to mother earth.
The woman’s burial posters and banners were already pasted in all the strategic locations and other parts of the tiny Igbara Edda village and its environs to enable guests to locate the burial venue easily. But the family members of the deceased got the shock of their lives when they went to collect the remains of the matriarch, only to discover that a different corpse was kept in the morgue for them to collect and bury.
This caused serious confusion, anger and added to their sorrow. But for soldiers who accompanied one of the daughters of the deceased to the mortuary, the mortuary attendants would have been lynched by irate youths who besieged the mortuary and attempted to burn it down over the development while sympathizers went home abandoning all that was prepared without the burial holding.
The brother of the deceased, Pastor Fred Okoro said it dawned on them when the family members went to the mortuary to get the corpse for lying in state and burial only to discover that a strange corpse was presented to them. He noted that the plot started a month after the deposit of the corpse was made as several efforts made by family members to see the condition of the corpse were allegedly frustrated by the morticians as they always claimed that the morgue was fumigated.
Okoro said he suspected foul play as those alleged to have mistaken his sister’s corpse for theirs had refuted the allegation. “It was discovered that those people deposited the body in May whereas my sister was deposited in July 2nd, 2021. “The corpse presented to us was not ours because my sister is tall about 6ft tall and we discovered that the person was shot. Not only that my sister plaited hair that fell down on her shoulder at the time of death but this one has low cut hair.
“The woman is my elder sister, she is about 10 years old than me. This woman had five sons and all the five sons have died. The last one that died, died in Austria and that was in December 2016. That person was her third son. She left behind two daughters. “Nobody believed that my sister will live up to the number of years she lived on earth because of what she passed through, losing five sons… She is a strong and hardworking woman despite being old. It was on that 28 December morning her burial was scheduled that we discovered that her corpse is no more in the mortuary.
“Canopies have already been set, well-wishers, friends, relatives, guests have already arrived and music was already playing. I was sitting down and waiting for them to bring her corpse from the mortuary and I waited very long and became worried why those who went to the mortuary had not arrived. “Eventually, one of our relations came in and said I was needed in the mortuary to come and identify my sister’s corpse. I told them that her two daughters are there, our last born is there and my sister’s grandchildren are there.
They insisted I should come and I had to go. “They ushered me into where the corpse is. I looked at the corpse and told them that it was not my sister because she is a bit taller than myself, she is a very tall woman and that corpse they showed me is short. “According to her one of her daughter who was closer to her before she passed on, her hair was plaited but the corpse they showed me that it is my sister was with a low haircut, grey hair.
“Another thing is that my sister does not go attend church though she secretly identified with Christ the corpse they showed me that they said is my sister was wearing a chaplet and I said this is not my sister. “I went to the hospital office and meet someone who told me that he was not the one that received my sister’s corpse and deposited her in the mortuary, that it was his colleague who was not on duty that my sister’s burial day maybe because of ill health.
“A call was placed and the man came and denied what that person I met in the office was saying. Then the man said, okay we should give him the receipt we used and deposit my sister in the mortuary so that they can check their record. “We told him to ask that his colleague, that the receipt had already been given to him. The man said he has given the receipt to one of us and we became very surprised because none of them agreed that we gave them the receipt.
“We started searching for the receipt in their office; turning everything around until a time the last daughter of that my late sister who is a Naval Officer said ‘oga check your pockets’ and the man said it is not in his pockets. “After some time again, she repeated the same thing but the man was very reluctant. This made that my sister’s last daughter tell the man, okay, I am going to search for you now. She immediately swung into action and two of them started struggling.
“That my sister’s last daughter was able to put her hand into the man’s pocket and brought out a receipt and it was that our receipt. “It was enveloped with N500. It looked as if it was money but when it was opened; it was our receipt to the shock of everybody. “After that, the man fabricated another lie and said the day my sister’s corpse was brought to the mortuary, he received about four corpses and that there is a possibility of misplacement of her corpse.
“We told her okay, let’s know who and who was received that day and he pointed to a particular place that it was a place he made a mistake. “Police officers went there and brought out the flex, it was then that at dawn on the first daughter of that my later sister who from August has been going there to see the corpse discovered something has gone wrong.
“One of us went there on the 26th December, two days to deliver the casket for the burial and the cloth with which the corpse will be dressed and he demanded to see the corpse and he was told that the mortuary was just fumigated. This was the same thing they always tell the first daughter of the deceased each time she goes there to see her mother.
“If not that last daughter of that my late sister who is a Naval Officer requested that some soldiers should follow her, our youths would have killed the man there and burnt down the mortuary because everywhere was rowdy despite calming our youths down.
“One of the Soldiers advised us to take the matter to the police station. The police have been following the matter up until about three days ago the Inspector here told me that the state Commissioner of Police has demanded that the case be transferred to Abakaliki. “We have gone to Abakaliki the state police headquarters and the command has sent their men to come to our place over the matter.
“I feel so sad about my sister’s missing corpse because of what I told you that have been befallen this woman and the entire town love her so much. “Nobody believes that she will live up to the years she lived. In our place, you don’t bury people during December but they said because of this woman, the burial must hold, that we should give her that honour. “Last August meeting, women came to our place and were told that my sister has died. They cancelled the August meeting in her honour. My sister was the women leader of this place. “We are feeling very bad over my sister’s missing corpse. Look at the money we have spent and we have invited people for the burial.
“The grave has already been dug and the youths have done that already waiting for the arrival of her corpse from the mortuary. I have told the police that I want to have the corpse of my sister so that I will bury her.” A member of the deceased family, Stephen Orji Okoro, said the grave that was dug for the woman’s burial can’t be closed, adding that she must be buried there.
“My brother, to tell you the truth, I am not happy. I was supposed to have gone back to Lagos where I am working with somebody but I am still in the village because of this matter. My people have been calling me in Lagos but I don’t know how I will go without seeing the corpse buried. “If they have buried our mother, let them bring her back so that we will bury her in our place.
We have already dug a grave and we can’t close that grave like that. “So, we need her body if at all that the mortuary attendants say yes, they misplaced the dead body. Let them bring even if it is her bone so that we can bury it in our place.
On her part, a daughter of the deceased, who is a Naval Officer, Welsie Okoro described the development as unbelievable noting that when they dragged the morticians to Owutu Police Station, they claimed that they mistakenly handed her mother’s corpse to another family for burial. “And even the mortuary attendant, Mr Felix said one of his colleagues said he knows the person he gave my mother’s corpse to.”
When contacted, the Manager of the Mortuary, Vincent Ude, said he was doing everything possible to recover the corpse. “Investigations are still on now, I am sure we are going to recover the corpse,” he said. The matriarch reportedly told one of her grandsons in a dream that she had been buried in another compound by strange people. This made her family members insist that they must find the place where she was buried and must exhume her corpse and bury it in the grave they prepared for her burial.
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