What exactly will make a man go from
a salon to salon collecting people’s hair in exchange for money?
This is a question that only a
60-year-old man, Adewale Okunade, a landlord of a house on Segun Olatunji
Street, Ijoko, Ota, Ogun State, has its answer.
Okunade, who hails from Oyo State,
narrowly escaped being lynched on Thursday when some people in the
neighbourhood pounced on him.
They alleged that the hair was being
taken to an herbalist in Cotonou, Republic of Benin, who uses it to prepare
charms for him.
Some people said they found Okunade’s
behaviour bizarre, insisting that there was more to his action.
It was gathered that the man had been
in the business for some years but nemesis caught up with him on the fateful
day when his ‘business partner’, a bricklayer, gave him away.
An executive member of the Community
Development Association said Okunade allegedly confessed that he had been
buying human hair.
According to the CDA executive, the
victim said he had been using the hair to cure himself of festering sores on
his leg.
He said the suspect denied the hair
was meant for rituals, saying he used to take the hair to an herbalist to
prepare concoctions for his sores.
He said many traditional medicine
practitioners who were there when Okunade was apprehended, said human hair
could only be used for rituals not for curing sores.
He said, “The suspect’s partner had
gone to a barber in their neighbourhood to buy some hair. The barber, however,
refused. The suspect sent his partner to go to the barber’s apprentice.
“When they got to the apprentice, he
agreed, but unknown to them that the barber was monitoring their movement. The
barber decided to lay ambush for them.
“When he (barber) saw them with a
cellophane bag, he raised the alarm and many people in the neighbourhood
were drawn to the scene. By the time they checked the contents in the bag, they
saw plenty of human hair.
“That was how the community pounced
on his partner and started questioning him about the source of the hair. It was
in the course of that the partner said it was Okunade who sent him.
“The people moved to Okunade’s house
but he was not around. When he came back and people related the incident to
him, he left the community the following day.
“By the time he came back, he thought
the residents would have forgotten about the incident, but when they saw him,
they mobbed him. It was then he explained that he had sores on his leg that
refused to heal and that he had been curing them with concoction mixed with
human hair.
“The community, not satisfied with
his explanation, decided to hand him over to the police at Sango Police
Station.”
Another resident, who craved
anonymity, said, “We have yet to come to terms with his pedestrian explanation.
As for us, he is not saying the whole truth.
“We learnt that he pays between
N200,000 and N300,000 for each consignment of hair. You can see that his
explanation lacks the essential elements of truth. I am also amazed that human
hair has become a cure for sores.”
The spokesman for Ogun State Police
Command, Mr. Muyiwa Adejobi, said the story was twisted by the community.
He said the suspect had only
solicited for hair because of his festering sores.
Adejobi said, “The story was not like
that. The man (Okunade) has a sore and he said he needed human hair to cure the
sore. He had not gotten the hair; he only solicited. The community just raised
the alarm which resulted in the man’s car being vandalised.
“He reported to the police that his
car was being vandalised and that they wanted to kill him. That was how the
police mediated to avoid the man being lynched.”
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Society
He's a ritualist and shud not go scot free.he has kild many thru dat way.let us be careful wit flimsy explanations.
ReplyDeleteHuman Hair?Sore??? No Correlation at all!Let Him face the Consequense of a ritualist joor!Our Barbers&Hairdressers Should be More careful about their Customers' Hair oº°˚˚˚°ºo O o ,May God Protect us All!AMEN!
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