A 37-year
old man, Mathew Ankyio, has denied killing his wife, saying she fell during an
argument with him, hit her chest on an iron cabinet and subsequently gave up
the ghost at the Wuse General Hospital, Abuja.
The Information technology worker said he could not explain the reason for the
domestic issue that led to his wife’s demise last Thursday.
Ankyio, who
is in police custody for homicide, said he had just returned home in the night
when his wife, who was eight months pregnant, held on to his shirt over an
unstated reason.
He said, “I
was surprised because we didn’t have any issue before I left the house in the
morning. I was telling her to leave my shirt and allow me to go and buy
recharge card because I needed to call a client who owed me some money.
“I broke her
hold on my shirt and she fell in the direction of an iron cabinet and I think
she hit her chest on the cabinet.
“I pulled
her up from the floor and she was shouting ‘Jesus, Jesus.’ She said she was not
feeling well and went to our next door neighbour’s room.”
Ankyio
explained that he went out to get recharge card, but decided to come back and
check on his wife.
He said he
found her in a terrible condition while the neighbour was praying for her.
“I found
that her condition was bad and deteriorating, so I quickly got a taxi and
rushed her to Wuse General Hospital and a doctor attended to her. I was
surprised when the doctor told me some minutes later that my wife was dead. Oh
God, this was a woman I was married to for nine years, what would I do now,” he
sobbed.
The bereaved
husband said he had relocated their three children to his grandmother in Benue
State, adding that he paid N35,000 for the removal of the unborn baby.
When asked
to defend allegations by neighbours that he usually quarrelled with his wife,
the IT worker denied it, saying the people often misconstrued his discussions
with his wife because they did not understand his Tiv language.
Asked about
his in-laws’ reaction to their daughter’s death, the suspect stated that they
did not raise any fuss about it “because my in-laws didn’t know me as a bad
person.”
He added
that the wife’s family members had approached the police to close the case so
that they could plan their daughter’s burial.
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