A stray bullet from a yet-to-be-identified source has allegedly hit and killed a 20-month-old child at Umuoba-Uratta in the Owerri North Local Government Area of Imo. The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the incident occurred at about 10p.m. on Monday.
n an interview with NAN, the mother of the deceased, Mrs Kelechi Eleweke, expressed shock over the “mysterious circumstances” surrounding the boy’s death. Narrating the incident, she said, “I was with him yesterday (Monday) night on my bed after dinner and night prayer.
“And one of my prayer points was that his father will not die a premature death, and my son answered, ‘Amen.’
“We got playing until he lay on my body to sleep. “Suddenly, he rolled down from my body and lay on the bed.
“He refused to sleep, in spite of my effort to lull him to sleep on my body. Instead, he shrugged me off. “A few seconds later, I heard a huge sound and felt a splash of sand-like objects on my body. “The next thing I saw was blood all over his body and the bed.”
Eleweke said that she quickly carried him and rushed outside for help. “My husband too got up, and we made efforts to get to a nearby private hospital,” she further said.
The woman, who was visibly heartbroken, said that instead of getting help from the hospital, the man that appeared like a doctor “demanded a police report before treating my child”. According to her, in spite of our several pleas to him to rescue our son, the man simply ran a plaster round his head and asked us to take him to the Federal Medical Centre (FMC), Owerri. She said that because she was half-dressed, she quickly returned home, while her husband continued with the effort to save their son.
Speaking further, the child’s father, Okechukwu, said that after waiting for a while on the road, he finally got a vehicle that took them to FMC. He said, “For the period we were in transit, I can say the boy was alive until we got to the FMC gate. “But getting into the emergency pediatrics ward, the doctor on duty quickly examined him and pronounced him dead on arrival.”
