Mrs Zainab Oladejo, the wife of Rauf Oladejo, a staff of the Federal Radio Corporation of Nigeria, says she is still in shock over the news of her husband taking his own life by jumping into the lagoon last Friday.
Rauf, a driver with the corporation, was newly transferred from the FRCN training school in Shogunle to the Broadcasting house in Lagos.
The sexagenarian and father of eight, was on his way to work, driving the company’s brown Toyota Corolla when he stopped on the third mainland bridge, pretending to be pressed and that he needed to urinate. Suddenly, he jumped, headfirst, from the bridge into the Lagoon.
His remains was later recovered in the lagoon by men of the Lagos state Emergency Management Authority, Marine Police, Lagos State Waterways Authority and Rapid Response Squad.
Reacting to the sad news of her husband’s demise and the way he died, Mrs Oladejo, said she could not give an explanation as to why her husband decided to take his own life, adding that he was a peace-loving husband and father.
“God is the only one who sees the intention of his heart for choosing to take his own life; I don’t know what could have been his reason. We have been married for over 40 years and nobody ever tried settling a dispute between us. When he was leaving for Lagos on Sunday, he prayed for us and one of the children followed him to the park. He was a peace-loving man; he was not in the habit of fighting with anyone and anytime he had money, he would buy things for all the children around.” she told Punch
Also, one of the sons of the deceased, Sheriff, said his father was not ill and that to the best of his knowledge, his father was not having any financial crisis.
“My father was not sick and he was not thinking about anything. If he was thinking about anything, he would have told me, because he did not hide anything from me. He did not have any money issue too, because if he needed money, he would call to tell us. Even the day his body was retrieved from the lagoon, more than N10,000 was recovered from his pocket. I believe that what is hidden to us as humans is open to God.” he said
Quite a number of people have committed suicide by jumping off Third mainland bridge this year
