“Stop Spreading Lies About How Somtochukwu Died” – Neighbour

By Adesina Soyooye

“Nobody noticed her absence until I went downstairs and found her lying facedown. Another neighour performed CPR on her. But she had already passed”

A neighour of Arise Television’s Somtochukwu Maduagwu, has warned some Nigerians to stop spreading lies about the circumstances surrounding her tragic death during an armed robbery attack on her apartment.

Explaining how the Arise Television’s News Anchor was discovered after the attack on the 16-flat Unique Apartments, Katampe, Abuja, she said it took a long time to realise that she was not accounted for.

She said she discovered Somtochukwu, lying face down,  accidentally, when she went downstairs, after the robbery to check what other havoc the robbers had wrought. It was heartbreaking, she said, that nobody noticed Somtochukwu until she (the neighour)went downstairs.

On seeing her, she said she screamed for a car to be brought but was disappointed that there was no urgency on the part of the Police Operatives who had then arrived.

She emphasized that it was a robbery attack, and not a case of assassination as is being insinuated in some quarters.

The neighour who tweeted from @lifegivingsun wrote: “Need people to stop spreading this agenda that they were assassins. They robbed a whole 18 flats in less than 15 mins. We all don’t have a conclusive reason on how she died because we found her lying flat in her blood, with no pants on.”

She disclosed that another neighour gave Somtochukwu Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) but that it was already late as she had already passed.

She said: “The most heartbreaking part was no one noticed her for so long – until I went downstairs to see what just happened to us and found her lying facedown. I was screaming for a car but the mobile police had no urgency. A neighour tried his best, gave her cpr, but she was gone.

This account confirms the position of the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike, who denied the insinuations that Somtochukwu was rejected by the Maitama General Hospital, arguing that she was brought in dead to the hospital.

Earlier, however, her colleague, Ojy Okpe, lamenting her death on the popular Arise Television’s Morning Show Wednesday, narrated in part: “She jumped from her home when she heard that 14 armed robbers had come to the house. She didn’t die on the spot. She went to the hospital and was rejected.”

Her family, too, holds the hospital partly responsible for her death. “Instead of treating her immediately, they were asking for her identity card”, the grieving and devasted family said.

President Bola Tinubu has ordered an investigation into the circumstances of her death.