Residents of Gado-Nasko, Kubwa, Abuja, were Thursday, thrown into mourning as a 48-year-old Ondo state indigene, Abdulrazak Wasiu, hung himself for allegedly not being able to provide enough for his family on the Eid-el celebration.
DAILY POST reports that the father of six who reportedly retired to bed hale and hearty, was seen dangling from his bedroom ceiling fan at about 7 a.m on Thursday, with his entire family, wailing over the sad incident.
When DAILY POST visited the scene of the incident, the deceased’s wife, Rekiya Wasiu, in a chat with our correspondent, said she had the biggest shock of her life when her 4-year-old son beckoned on her to behold the tragic scene of her husband.
Rekiya said, “I slept in the children’s room last night because my first child was ill and it was too late to take her to the hospital, since we all believed she would get better after some self-medications.
“I told my husband to go to bed that I will join him, only for me to have slept off in the children’s room.
“Earlier yesterday, my husband had complained bitterly that we may not be able to celebrate the ‘Ileya’ in a grand style as we intended. I told him all will be well, that a miracle could happen before morning. All through yesterday, he was moody,” she sobbed.
“A neighbour called me at about 5 p.m yesterday to say he saw my husband at abattoir, where they sell rams and cows. He said my husband was probably negotiating to buy one. He said he later saw him sitting on the floor with his hand on his chin. I called my husband to please come back home but he said if he didn’t buy the biggest ram, he would rather kill himself. I thought it was just a joke. He however, came home much later empty handed and we laughed over everything.
“I don’t know what to do,” the mother of six lamented. Where do I start from? How can I bear the shame that my husband killed himself because he couldn’t provide Sallah for his family? What kind of life is this?” Rekiya quizzed rhetorically.
When asked if her husband was perhaps depressed over something else, she said, “No way. I know my husband well enough. Nothing else was bothering him. He is a truck driver and in a week, he makes enough to cater for us and keeps in the bank but throughout last week, the owner of the trucks he drives, had issues with the police and all his trucks were confiscated.”
A neighbour, who simply identified himself as Ebuka, spoke with our correspondent saying, “Oga Wasiu sabi celebrate Sallah. If he no fit do this one, e mean say he go kill himself?
“Well, it is quite unfortunate,” Ebuka added, saying a doctor in the neighbourhood said he was already dead immediately residents rushed in to the scene after his wife raised an alarm.
When contacted, Chief Superintendent Nurudeen Sabo, the Divisional Police Officer (DPO) at Kubwa Police Command, confirmed the incident and said, “Wonders shall never end.”
He, however, ordered that the corpse be deposited at a nearby hospital but Rekiya debunked saying there would be no need for that.
She said, “We are Muslims and we don’t keep dead bodies for too long. I have contacted our kinsmen in the resident and they are on their way.
As at press time, however, the kinsmen were yet to arrive the scene. The corpse was wrapped with white linen in a mat and deposited at the balcony.
