In a bid to evade arrest by the operatives of the Nigerian Police Force, a young man simply identified as Oge has drowned in Elechi River in the Diobu area of Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital.
The victim, according to sources, was playing with his friends around 4 pm when the police suddenly appeared and began to shoot sporadically which forced people in the area to scamper in different directions.
The scamper for safety led the victim to run into the river to escape the policemen. And Oge who could not swim drowned.
Upon the realizing that Oge had drowned, some youths in the area reportedly protested against the incident after the policemen left, and took the victim’s corpse to the Diobu Police Division, and later to the Braithwaite Memorial Specialist Hospital, where doctors confirmed him dead.
While speaking to a correspondent, an eyewitness who identified himself as Kelvin, said Oge jumped into the river out of fear of arrest and immediately drowned as he could not swim.
Kelvin added that the policemen watched him as he struggled to save himself from drowning, while residents that could have helped him stood afar to avoid being arrested by the security men.
He said, “Oge was playing with his friends when the police arrived and started shooting. Everybody ran in different directions and he (Oge) jumped into the river.
“After jumping into the water, he struggled for about 20 minutes but nobody helped him. The police only watched and never tried to save him and we (residents) could not save him because the police were around.”
Another eyewitness, Michael, however, said the victim was in the toilet when the team of the policemen stormed the area, causing panic as they fired into the air, adding that Oge ran out of the toilet and dived into the river to escape, and got drowned.
“Oge was not a bad boy, he was relieving himself when the policemen came. He ran out of the toilet in panic. Unfortunately, he jumped into the river and drowned because he could not swim and we are all sad about it,” he added.
The state Police Public Relations Officer, Nnamdi Omoni, said that the policemen were after suspected armed robbers and never shot at anybody, adding that the victim ought not to have dived into the river since he had nothing to do with the crime.
He said, “Policemen were there to arrest some suspected armed robbers and the man suddenly jumped into the river and drowned. If you look at the body of the man, you will not see any gunshot injury on his body.
“That he jumped into the river when the police were not chasing him leaves much to be desired.”
