Posted by By TONY OSAUZO, Benin on
The missing Edo State Commissioner for Information and Orientation, Barrister Calus Enoma, has been found dead in one of the rooms of Palm Royal Hotel, in Ugbowo area of Benin, the state capital.
The missing Edo State Commissioner for Information and Orientation, Barrister Calus Enoma, has been found dead in one of the rooms of Palm Royal Hotel, in Ugbowo area of Benin, the state capital.
The late commissioner was said to have had a deep cut on his forehead while his body was swollen and stinking at the time police detectives forced the door to his room open on Monday.
Top police sources told Daily Sun that the late commissioner was found dead naked on a bed in the hotel room.
According to the police sources, Enoma had driven himself to the hotel on Friday night in a car that bore no security number. He was said to have dropped his police orderly at his residence, where the policeman also lives, before driving out alone.
At the Palm Royal Hotel, where the state Governor, Prof. Oserheimen Osunbor led government officials, Assistant Inspector-General of Police for Zone 5, Mr. Udom Ekpoudum and the state Commissioner of Police, Mr. Chris Dega, to see the corpse of the late commissioner, the Managing Director Barrister Jude Nosagie, revealed that Enoma personally checked into the hotel last Friday night.
He explained that a staff of the hotel who checked in the commissioner, was already helping the police in their investigations.
The corpse of the late Enoma was later taken away in an ambulance marked ED60A08. AIG Ekpoudom told journalist that investigation into the incident was on.
In a statement signed by Secretary to the State Government, Mr. Joe Akhigbe, the Edo State government described the death of the commissioner as 'shocking, sad and painful and a great loss to the government and people of Edo State."
The statement said: 'Barrister Enoma was, this morning, found dead in a hotel room in the state capital, having left his residence at about 10:00pm on Friday, 28th March, 2008, after receiving a telephone call from an unidentified caller.
'The governor is saddened and depressed by the unfortunate loss."
The statement said that security agencies have commenced investigation into the circumstances surrounding the commissioner's death. It expressed the government's heartfelt condolences to the commissioner's wife, Mrs. Julie Enoma and members of his family.
Meanwhile, the Edo State chapter of the Action Congress (AC) on Monday said the statement by the Special Adviser on Communication to Governor Osunbor, Mr. Tony Ikpasaja, demanding that Comrade Adams Oshiomhole and the AC should produce Barrister Enoma within 48 hours or face dire consequences was a smokescreen to clamp down on the AC governorship candidate.
Addressing journalists on Monday, AC chairman, in Edo State, Prince Tony Omoaghe, said by making such statement the PDP-led government wants to cause confusion in the state and then link it with the Action Congress.
While disclosing that the AC had contacted its team of lawyers to file a multi-million naira libel suit against Mr. Ikpasaja, the PDP and Governor Osunbor, the AC chairman alleged that the Osunbor-led faction of the PDP had resolved that rather than have Oshiomhole govern the state, 'it would make the state ungovernable and precipitate a state of emergency."
Also on Monday, the National Conscience Party, in a statement signed by its National Chairman, Dr. Osagie Obayuwana, called for the sack of Mr. Ikpasaja for asking Oshiomhole and the AC to produce the late Enoma when the matter was yet to be reported to the police.
'Spokespersons for government ought to know that what they say is capable of inflaming passions and they ought to exercise great caution in making public pronouncements," the statement said.
The party also expressed sadness over Enoma's death.