Ubulu-Ukwu’s Obi Ofulue III: Four Year’s Unsolved Murder

 The year 2016 started on a dreadful note for the town of Ubulu-Ukwu, Aniocha-North LGA of Delta State. It was just fifth day of the year that was still fresh and unfolding and with abundant hopes for the new year, when tragedy struck the town. 

What did happen? Well, as the Vanguard newspaper of January 24, 2016 put it: “UBULU-UKU – despicable, abominable, horrible, detestable, repugnant, name it. But words are not enough to express the act that has caused agony for the people of Ubulu-Uku Kingdom in Aniocha South Local Government Area of the State. 

Their monarch, HRM Akaeze Edward Ofulue III, abducted 19 days ago at about 4.00 pm, on January 5, 2016, by suspected Fulani herdsmen, was discovered stone dead 15 days after the creepy incident. 

In Ubulu-Uku and other kingdoms, it is a taboo to kidnap a king, not to talk of killing him. Vigilante group members found his decomposing remains at the stomp of a tree in the bush at Umunede, Ika North East local government area, the boundary between Delta and Edo States. 

Ofulue III, a lawyer, businessperson and an ardent Christian of the Deeper Christian Life Ministry was driving with a young pastor of the church, who also served as one of his aides in his Land Cruiser Jeep, along the notorious Obior/ Igbodo Road when the abductors struck at a disgracefully bad spot. The bad spot, about 40 kilometers from his country home, has been a flash-point in recent times – many persons, including two Catholic Priests were kidnapped at the spot by suspected Fulani herdsmen, who more often than not lay siege there. 

A vigilante group member, who pleaded anonymity, said they discovered two decomposing corpses in the bush but were able to identify the monarch “because of his beads and apparel,” adding, “The king’s corpse was found resting at the bottom of a palm tree.” The source, who was cornered by our correspondent in the community, said; “We could not identify the second body but the fellow had Hausa shoes on. This is a very challenging period for us in this kingdom. I was one of those who went in search of the king.” 

That was in 2016! And even as you are reading this sorry story in the month of October 2020, nothing beyond what the Vanguard published in the wake of the discovery of the lifeless body of the monarch in the bush, has been added to the deposit of public knowledge. Put differently, it means that for years, the sordid murder of a king, that murder most foul, that unconscionable act that should scandalise the people of any nation that takes itself serious as a nation under the rule of the law, has not only been solved, there is nothing to show that the Police is seriously striving to solve it. 

Yet, it is a fact of life that not too long after that abduction and murder of the Obi, the Police paraded some persons suspected of having committed that heinous crime. Even now, anyone could download or watch video, titled “Police Parade Killers of Obi Of Ubulu-Uku Kingdom and Others” showing the suspected criminals. The narrator in that video said clearly and I quote: “while parading the suspects, the Force Public Relations Officer says that one of the victims who was kidnapped with the late monarch in January this year, but later escaped (from the kidnappers) identified one Umaru Mohammed, also known as Small, as the leader of the kidnapping gang. His arrest by the Special Anti-Kidnapping operatives in Delta state, led to the apprehension of some suspected gang members while others are still at large”. A policeman, DCP, Don Anwuna could be seen addressing the journalists and assuring Nigerians of the preparedness of the Nigeria Police to deal with kidnappers. Salihi Abdulahi of NTA News was the narrator, so there is little doubt that the video clip came from the government-owned Nigerian Television Authority, and so, is authentic. 

Yet, four long years down the line, the murder has not been solved. The killers of that king have not been punished. Justice has not yet been done by a Nigeria that should have swiftly punished any murderer. 

The tears that have formed furrows in the face of the immediate family of the late king’s immediate family, his wife and children, his extended family and in the faces of Ubulu-Ukwu people everywhere have not been made to dry up – simply because those who abducted and slayed the amiable king, a man with a winsome smile, an easy going king, in whose face a smile usually played, and whose consuming ambition was just to see peace and progress blanket everywhere in the town. That smile was snuffed out devilishly. 

Four years down the line, a message has not been sent to the marauding killer herdsmen that they should exit their murderous career of mayhem. Instead, they have often turned Ubulu-Ukwu and environs into fertile ground in which to sow seeds of havoc and senseless killings. Since that time, as though daring, no mocking the Nigeria Police, they have been kidnapping hapless individuals on the roads that lead into and out of Ubulu-Ukwu. They have also been abducting people from their farms, on the way to church, etc. 

In fact the entire Anioma area of Delta state appears to have become a hunting ground for kidnaping and killer suspected herdsmen. 

The late monarch, HRM Obi Ofulue II, had been on the throne for just ten years when the suspected killer herdsmen took away his life. 

Was his death a set-up? Or was it a dastardly act by hoodlums out for quick money through ransom payment? Nobody would know until a real court trial has unearthed the real motives of those that carried it out. Some have said unknown persons suspected to be the Fulani herdsmen called the king, claiming that they saw his beads and money and that he should come to collect them. They told him to drive to the notorious road and the king not knowing that it was a set-up, set out to meet with them. His fleeing houseboy linked up with the herdsmen, who talked him into arranging the monarch for ransom. 

That remains a speculation, perhaps wild, perhaps well-informed, until the man who was abducted with him but who escaped, could say all he knows. 

However, while a version said only he and the pastor were in the car, another said they were three, including his driver. 

As the Vanguard reported then, “At the bad spot, the herdsmen, who laid ambush, came out shooting sporadically. It was obvious they were old in the game, as they led him into the bush immediately leaving his SUV on the roadside”. 

Unfortunately, that same bad spot between Obior and Igbodo villages, are still bad spots four years later. But the bad spots have actually increased to the extent that one could say that the entire Anioma area has become a vast single bad spot. And the hardworking Governor of Delta State, who successfully ensured that peace reigned in Ubulu-Ukwu after the death of Obi Ofulue III by giving the staff of office to his son, the youngish Obi Ofulue III, offered him a scholarship to do his undergraduate studies in Law, will be watching his efforts to transform the state being frustrated as farmers are now afraid to tend their farms for fear of kidnappers and rapists. And my people are agrarian. To stop them from farming is to cut off their livelihood. 

The Obi’s death devastated Delta’s Governor Ifeanyi Okowa. According to a newspaper report: “The governor who became dumbfounded upon hearing the news of the death of the monarch, said, Friday evening, that his death had opened a sacrilegious chapter in the history of the state and vowed that the state, under his watch, would ensure that his abduction and subsequent death would be thoroughly investigated”. 

Four years down the It would be most uncharitable not to grant that a terrible disaster hit the town with the death of His Royal Highness Obi Edward Akaezi Ofulue 111. It was as unexpected as it was tragic. It unsettled everyone and everything. The town has yet to recover. About a decade and a half ago, when Ubulu-Uku mourned the Obi Ofulue 11, memorial textile prints that bore his much-loved burst were distributed and bought by the Ubulu-Uku people even in far-flung areas of the country and beyond because that was actually a celebration of life. This time, the town was not involved in any celebration of life. It was dealing with the aftermath of a death most callous, most heartless, most inexplicable. 

The only good fallout so far is the peace that reigns in the town, after a seamless succession: The entire world just witnessed a seamless succession from father to first son as happened from Obi Ofulue 1 to Obi Ofulue 11 to Obi Ofulue 111 and now to His Royal Highness Obi Akaeze 1. Later this month the town would be celebrating the Iwu Festival. Life will of course return to normal, but it is most normal to ask the question: “Nigeria, please fish those that abducted and killed His Royal Majesty Edward Akaezi Ofulue, the Obi Ofulue 111. I know I am not asking for too much. Instead, I am asking for the most normal of things in any civilized society”. This suspected herdsmen’s scourge must stop; it has gone one for two long and has damaged the society.