Rivers: Family Of Murdered Man Narrate How Beheaded Corpse Was Recovered, Seek Justice

The family of one Mr Kingsley Okon Obot, a 39-year-old employee of Ellan Star Marine, Portharcourt, who was allegedly murdered in Rivers State, have asked for justice.

THE WHISTLER gathered that Obot was gruesomely murdered and beheaded at the premises of the company in May and thrown into the sea.

His body was later found by personnel of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad at the deck of a ship belonging to the said Ellan Star Marine, two weeks after.

According to one of his relatives who spoke to THE WHISTLER, the late Obot was on March 7 called by one Mr Joseph Kawaja, a co-worker, to meet him up in Calabar, Cross River State, for the documentation of a vessel they were expecting, which had arrived in the town for onward movement to Rivers State.

Obot agreed to the plan and subsequently informed his brother and other members of his family about his movement.

Initially, he was communicating with the members of his family, who were also sending upkeep money to him through another colleague, Eyo Ita Boco, until May 5 when he became unreachable.

The family made frantic efforts to reach him but all proved abortive. His disappearance coincidentally happened in the heat of the COVID-19 lockdown when movement was restricted.

With no idea of how else to reach him as the family had no way of communicating with the company that employed him, they sent a family friend to the organisation but the attempt did not yield any meaningful outcome.

After the lockdown was eased, his brother, Donald and a relative named Idongesit went to the company to make enquiries about his whereabouts but met the biggest shock of their lives.

“They said that he went out to drink but never came back. They later told us that he entered the river and never came back. They said that they reported the situation to the Woji Police Station as a case of a missing person. I then left to report the situation to a family friend who is a senior police officer in Port Harcourt.

“In less than an hour, Mr Eyo Ita Boco, my brother’s colleague at Ellan Star called me and said that the water wave had brought out a corpse to the company’s jetty, that we should come and confirm if it was my brother’s remains. We hurriedly moved with the police officer who was accompanied by his team to the company.

“The staff of the company wasn’t expecting us to show up with the policemen, so they refused to open the gate until the officer started scolding them before we were allowed to get in”.

“I recognised the remains of my brother even though he was beheaded and a chemical substance poured on his body for speedy decomposition. The police personnel then took me to Woji Police Station where the company claimed to have reported the case”.

“The Woji Police Station moved to the company’s premises and arrested the staff of the company, and also instructed that they should locate the missing head and attach it to the body”.

“After getting the head, the police officers at Woji Police Station accompanied me and staff of Ellan Star Marine to the morgue where his body was deposited”.

“I immediately noticed that officers from Woji began to compromise by asking me to accept the company’s monetary settlement and not bother about autopsy or investigations”.

“The following day, the staff of the company who were previously arrested were released,” Donald said.

In a petition to the Rivers State Commissioner of Police, the family alleged that the management of Ellan Star threatened to kill the same co-worker, who showed the body to them.

They said this action showed that the murder was intended as insiders informed them that many workers had died mysteriously in the company in the past.

The petition, signed by their lawyer, Paulinus James Idio & Co., states that:

“Our client reported the case at Woji Police Division and seven suspects were arrested but they were all released the same day wherein our client alleged compromise as the IPO was constantly calling him to settle with the company and allow the case to die naturally.

“We are not confident with the operation of the Woji Police Division and we are most fervently calling on you to take over the matter and arrest the perpetrators and investigate the case of murder and conspiracy to cover up.

“Our client, a man of good report, would not want to take laws into his hands as they may cause serious mayhem, breakdown of law and order and untold hardship on innocent residents of the area. “