How a Lagos Husband held his wife and Children, Captive for Seven years

Wednesday, December 17, 2014 0

Relations of late Segun Ogunlola, the man who held his wife, Pa­tience and children captive for seven years have revealed details on his life pri­or to his disappearance. The fresh facts that emerged paint a picture of a man who was deeply troubled and had over time developed psychological problems that ultimately im­pacted on his relationship with his immediate and extended family as well as the general society.

Ogunlola died on October 25, and was buried the same day. Until his demise, he lived in isolation in Aba­ranje, Ikotun/Igando Local Council Development Area, Lagos, with his wife and their four children in a cor­rugated zinc shack built on a portion of swampy land that he acquired. But on Tuesday, October 21, his wife and children breathed the sweet air of freedom, when concerned individu­als rescued them after Oguntola had gone out to get treatment at a hospital and the severely malnourished wife crawled out of the shack to call on passersby for help.


Prior to incarceration
As Sunday Sun learnt from Mrs Stella Erinle, elder sister of Patience, Ogunlola was a civil engineer who graduated from Ondo State Univer­sity (now Ekiti State University, Ado Ekiti. Patience on her part graduated from Delta State University with a degree in Business Administration. Ogunlola and Patience met at Quest Secondary School in Lagos. While Patience was full time staff of the school, Ogunlola taught Physics in the school on part time basis. And they lived next to each other. Prox­imity made it possible for a relation­ship to develop between them. As at the time, Patience was living with Erinle, but never disclosed her deep­ening relationship with Ogunlola. When her family learnt about it, they raised objection on the ground that Ogunlola had a bad attitude.

Before long, the family learnt that Patience had become pregnant, and were therefore compelled to accept Ogunlola as a son-in-law despite his alleged bad temper and anti-social be­haviour.
Commenting on this, Erinle told Sunday Sun: “From the beginning of the relationship, we observed the man liked to isolate himself; he al­ways felt inferior and because of that complex, he kept away from the fam­ily. I once asked Patience how she and the man related to each other. I told her I would not interfere in the rela­tionship but would rather continue to pray for her.”


Consistent with traditional practice, the two extended families were in­troduced to each other. The birth of a baby by Patience did little to mitigate the reservations the family had about her husband. Erinle remembers call­ing Patience to ask after her welfare and complained about the perceived inferiority complex by Ogunlola.

Erinle said Patience reassured her of Ogunlola’s love towards her but noted that he was angered that people looked down on him because of his low economic status brought about by his being unemployed despite gradu­ating as an engineer.

Ogunlola, Patience ‘disappear’ from known abode
The first alarm was raised when a female friend of Patience, whose fa­ther was a director of a bank secured a job for her but Patience could not be reached to attend interviews. Erin­le said she and Ogunlola had moved without informing any member of the family and neither did they leave their address with neighbours.

But one day, while Erinle was on her way to attend the birthday party of a friend’s daughter, she spotted Ogun­lola at the junction of the road leading to the friend’s house. She stopped and tried to engage him in conversation, wanting to know the whereabouts of her sister. He ignored her, until some passersby challenged him. His atti­tude prompted them to drag him to Ikotun Police Station.
At the station, a police officer or­dered him to bring the wife to the sta­tion and directed a police constable to accompany him to the place where he resided. After a while he brought the wife to the station. Erinle said she was deeply shocked by the sight of her sister: “My sister who is a graduate was not looking very well. But do you know that she denied me before the police. She said she never knew me. I was shocked.” Not till after Patience was rescued from captivity did Erinle learn the truth of why she denied her.

From what Patience related to her, Erinle said when Ogunlola got back home, he kept the police constable outside, went inside and threatened to kill his wife if she identified Erinle as her sister. With fear, she followed her husband to the station and did as Ogunlola directed her: she denied her own sister.

Account of Ogunlola’s family
While Erinle’s family was busy searching for Patience and her hus­band, the family of Ogunlola was equally disturbed that he had seem­ingly vanished without a trace. Pastor Joseph Ogunlola, elder brother of the late Segun Ogunlola told Sunday Sun that his late brother was tough and very difficult but extremely bril­liant. He recalled that he last saw him at the naming ceremony of Ogunlo­la’s first son. According to him, Se­gun moved out of his house at Idimu without telling anybody. The family traced him to the Abaranje address, where he lived for one year before he moved without leaving any forward­ing address.

“The second time we went to visit him, they were no more there and we didn’t get answers until nine years lat­er, when I was called to a hospital to see him. That was when I asked him why he just disappeared without in­forming anyone. All he could tell me was that he was producing chalk and the neighbours claimed that he was disturbing them. So he started look­ing for a place where he could con­tinue his production activities. That was when he moved to the swampy land. He was working there till he be­came sick months prior to his death. The business suffered due to his ill-health,” Pastor Joseph said.

Joseph explained that none of the family members knew where he was staying and even their mother had been to Abaranje many times to look for him. As the wife of Pastor Joseph re­called, there was a day she saw Ogun­lola two years ago at Crest View School, Ikotun, where he had come to sell white board mark­ers and chalk produced by him. “So I ran after him and said, ‘My husband’s father, where have you been? We have been looking for you; we went to where you were living. We didn’t find you.’ He didn’t answer me. I followed him to the bus stop and almost caused a scene but he didn’t answer. I called his brother to inform him of what happened and went to the school to find out about him. I got his cell phone number from the principal of the school and gave him a call. When he knew I was the one talking, he dropped the call. Three days later, my son and I saw him at Ikotun mar­ket. We greeted him and asked of his family but he didn’t answer us.”

Pastor Joseph stated that his broth­er was not violent, but acknowledged that he had a habit of keeping quiet and not talking to anybody whenever he was angry. He agreed that Ogunlo­la may have changed in the past nine years when the family had no contact with him. According to him, Ogunlola was a jovial person.

His words: “If you have the chance, go back to that hospital. Ask them of the last days of his life. My brother and I left the hospital at 8:30pm. The doctor said he was with them at the recep­tion, joking with them and they said since he was alright, he would be discharged. He went to his room. But at 9pm, we were called that he was dead. Even the doctor was baf­fled. All I know is that frus­t r a ­tion killed him. Nigeria is a place that frus­trates it citizens. He was a civil engi­neer who didn’t get a good job for 18 years. What kind of life do you think he would live?”

Road to freedom for wife, children
In the first week of October 2014, Erinle dreamt that Patience came back to the family. Excited, she related the news to her younger sister, Anne. Ex­actly two weeks later after the dream, she was called at a saloon to come and identify Patience at Abaranje, who was already six months pregnant and expecting her fifth child.

With providence clearly orches­trating the deliverance of Patience, the once captive woman had a dream a few days to her rescue and saw anointing oil being poured on her chest. When she woke up, her san­ity returned and she asked herself, ‘What am I doing in this place?’ She had wanted to ask Ogunlola about it but an inner voice cautioned her not to show awareness, otherwise he would kill her. So she decided to act dumb. And October 21, 2014, Erinle’s dream came to pass and Patience was re-united with the family.

New day for Patience
After her rescue with her chil­dren, Pastor Joseph said that at first, he didn’t know her whereabouts because his family was told she was taken to Ajah. Later a senior Pas­tor in his area who saw the family informed him. When they visited them, Patience identified him and his wife. Pastor Joseph applauded Patience’s devotion to taking care of the children and teaching them at home. The period spent in the swampy home was used by Patience to teach the children and educate them. She was so good and determined about this that the first two children are now at the level of Prima­ry 4 based on what they have learnt through their mother’s coaching. He gave glowing re­ports that Patience and the chil­dren are recuperating in their new home. He said his family hopes to take custody of the children.

Tags:

No comments

Subscribe to: Post Comments ( Atom )
Powered by Blogger.