Awka – The Anambra State chapter of the National Human Rights Commission on Monday said it is committed to protecting the rights of a 34-year-old widow, Mrs Chioma Asomugha from Ubahuekwem village in Ihiala, Ihiala Local Government Area of the State, including reinstating her to her late husband’s house.
The widow, a mother of four, had over the weekend, raised alarm and in an interview with newsmen in Awka, alleged that the brothers of her late husband, Charles, are accusing her of having a hand in the death of their brother.
According to the widow, her brothers-in-law have insisted she must drink the water used in bathing her late husband’s corpse to prove that she was not of the crime she was accused of.
A source at the NHRC office in Awka, who would not want the name mentioned, while describing the practice as obnoxious, disclosed that the widow, Chioma was thrown out of the house jointly built by her husband’s nuclear family.
According to the source, the widow was being sheltered by a former President-General of Ubahuekwem autonomous community, before the Commission and other people’s intervention.
“I called the widow yesterday in the night and she told me how the deceased husband’s siblings wanted to make trouble early in the morning but Mr. Osita Agoms, the eldest member of her deceased husband’s family and the owner of the compound where she took refuge when she was thrown out of the deceased husband’s family house by the husband’s siblings intervened and stopped them from causing any trouble. She told me that later in the evening the husband’s siblings tried to make trouble again when her relatives from Oraifite came but the same man intervened. She told me that the man and the leaders of the Community kept to their promise that they will ensure that the burial went on without any hitch or trouble,” the NHRC source told TNC correspondent on Monday.
When contacted, a community leader in the area, Chief Gerald Nnabugwu, said the community has waded into the matter and pleaded with the Rights Commission, Civil Society Organisations and interested individuals to stay actions in respect of the case, except if there are issues they couldn’t handle.
TNC also gathered that with the intervention of the interested organisations and individuals, including the State Commissioner for Information and Public Enlightenment, Mr C-Don Adinuba, the burial of the deceased had been concluded without hitches.
