Man Slits Own Throat Over N800,000 Debt In Ogoja

An unfortunate end it was for one Mr. Gabriel Agochi of Ndok in Ishibori, Ogoja Local Government Area of Cross River State when he allegedly slaughtered himself with a machete because he couldn’t repay a loan granted him by a local thrift association.

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Agochi who was said to be in his mid 40s and a transport operator residing in Agiga in Ogoja Local Government of the state until his death, had a transport company with a fleet of three golf cars.
It was gathered that Agochi wanted to take advantage of the ember months to make brisk money thus he allegedly approached the local thrift association, Agiga Ususu Association, to collect a loan of N600,000 (six  hundred thousand naira) to enable him add to the number of cars in his fleet.
A member of the association and close fried of the deceased who gave his name as Mike said Gabriel “had one golf car with which he was operating his business but early this year he came to us and got the sum of N600,000 to add with his own and bought Volkswagen golf  car.”
He said that instead of him to repay the N600,000 loan he collected from the thrift association, he went ahead and  bought another golf in September to add to his fleet of cars in readiness for the December rush.
However, nature had other plans as the Ogoja-Calabar highway which is already in a state of pathetic disrepair, was further devastated leading to low returns from the cars which made it impossible to keep to the terms of paying back the loan as agreed.
The association it was gathered had notified him about two weeks ago that it was their tradition to share their money in the last week of November so that members can plan for Christmas which is the principal reason for the thrift and that the interest his loan accrued was N200, 000 making it a total of N800, 000 to be paid to the association.
The deceased reportedly made frantic efforts to raise the money to no avail and in a final attempt, he called his elder brother who works in Abuja to come to his rescue, but got a November ending date for respite.
Gabriel according to sources was said to have told his brother that if he failed to respond soon, he might not meet him, a remark which the sources claimed irked his brother who wanted to know “where he was leaving to.”
But on Tuesday last week, Gabriel allegedly picked his machete and headed towards the backyard, when his wife asked him what he wanted to do with the machete, he reportedly told her that he wanted to clear  grass at the back yard.
A neighbor who gave her name as Jacinta said, “It was there he used the sharp knife to tear his throat and started to bleed heavily. When his phone rang and  his wife went it to the backyard to give to him that she  saw the man on the ground bleeding and she shouted for help.”
He was rushed to the hospital but died few hours after and his body was deposited at the Ogoja General Hospital mortuary.
“There is more than meets the eye in that suicide case. Said a police source in Ogoja Divisional Police Station said. “A man with three cars and lives in his own house cannot sell one of those to pay his debts but had to cut himself with a machete. We are still investigating the matter any way” the source added.