Betting to death: Tragic story of barber who drank to his grave over N10,000
Oyinfade had headed for the gym that
fateful morning to refresh his muscles and keep fit ahead of a job the
next day at an annual show in the Ikosi area of Ketu, a suburb within
the metropolis. He remained at the gym with fellow ‘bouncers’ till late
in the afternoon when he went home to relax before later heading for his
salon to attend to customers and supervise his apprentice, Emmanuel,
who had been there all alone. This was only four days after he had
resolved a protracted personal issue with his wife. The couple had been
temporarily separated for some time after losing their accommodation
owing to financial difficulties. The lady and their two children had
been living with her mother at the Ibafo area of Ogun State for some
time as a result while the 34-year-old managed with a friend at the Mile
12 area of Lagos. So, making peace with his wife and best friend of
many years earlier that week left Oyinfade extremely happy. Apart from
dancing vigorously in front of his salon that Thursday evening, the Ogun
native treated himself to a bottle of a popular alcoholic mixture. It
was compensation for all the emotional pains he had passed through while
the crisis lasted. But just when the ‘groove’ was garnering momentum,
tragedy struck. Life has not been the same for the entire household.
“Everything happened like a movie,”
Emmanuel, Oyinfade’s apprentice, recalled during a chat with our
correspondent earlier in the week. “My boss arrived shop that evening
looking unusually happy, there was no reason to suspect that danger was
lurking around the corner. He sent me to buy food for him before later
asking me to go buy him a bottle of a particular alcoholic mixture at a
nearby shop. He was alone in front of the shop and was dancing happily
as he took the drink.
“Later, some of his friends joined in
the celebration and in the process, one of them challenged him to a bet.
He dared him to finish 10 bottles of the drink and that if he did that,
he was going to reward him. My boss took up the challenge and for the
next hour, I was sent to buy a new bottle of that drink almost every
five minutes. The other guys were also drinking but my boss was on a
different level. Before we knew what was happening, he had taken over
five bottles. I was afraid but could do nothing to stop him. It was
until he attempted to shake a friend that we realised the damage the
drink had done to him,” the young apprentice said.
The heavily-built 34-year-old crashed to
the ground three different times as he made moves to shake a friend. He
had completely lost control of himself and could hardly stand without
support. He was subsequently carried by the people around and laid on
the floor inside the compound housing his salon. The huge volume of
alcohol in his system had totally immobilised and grounded him. Left in
the open, on bare floor till the following day, his defences had been
dealt a crushing blow. He was in a precarious situation.
“When I arrived home that night, my
elder sister told me that somebody was sleeping on the floor outside and
that she didn’t know who it was,” Bimbo, a neighbour to Oyinfade, told Saturday PUNCH.
“When I got close, I realised it was Prosper, he had vomited all over
his face and body and was even inhaling the vomit. I ran out to get help
and some of his friends came with me to wash his face with water and
also change his sleeping position. One of them said that since he had
vomited, he would feel better. I couldn’t sleep that night; I had to
keep watch over him. At about 4:00am, I noticed that his breathing
changed. We had to rush him to the hospital by dawn but he was rejected
at the two places we took him to,” she said.
Confused and now under pressure,
Oyinfade’s elder sibling, Taiwo, who had been called over to the area
where he stayed and worked, together with few sympathisers hired a
vehicle to take him to a government-owned hospital at the Ikorodu area
of the city in a desperate attempt to save his life. At this point, his
condition had degenerated so badly that only a miracle could keep him
alive. Time was running out. The odds weren’t looking good.
“I was constantly communicating with
Prosper’s elder brother since I didn’t accompany them to the hospital at
Ikorodu,” Dotun, a colleague at the gym where the 34-year-old kept fit,
told our correspondent. “Initially he told me that the doctors were
attending to him and that everything would soon be fine. After about 30
minutes, I called back again and he gave the same report. Some of us at
the gym felt relieved at that point, believing that he was getting
better. But 30 minutes later, the man called back to break the news of
his death to us. It was a huge shock to many of us.
“The body, after being rejected at the
hospital’s mortuary in Ikorodu, was brought back to a church opposite
his shop at Mile 12. As at 1:00pm, the corpse was still lying on the
floor within the premises. The brother was confused; he didn’t know what
to do. We had to contribute about N11, 000 for him to take the body to
Abeokuta.
“Prosper was an easy-going person who
usually attended a special service in church every Thursday evening. I
cannot tell why he didn’t go on this particular day and instead engaged
in a drinking bet. I don’t know why he had to end his life like this,”
Dotun said.
Though, full of life and bubbling with
plans for the future, Oyinfade perhaps had an inkling of the calamity
that was about to befall him. Apart from acting unusually in the days
leading to his death, close associates told Saturday PUNCH that
more than a few things about him took a different dimension during the
period. He became a completely different person at the time.
“That Thursday, just before the incident
happened, Prosper, I was told, played music loudly in his shop and
danced like he had never done before,” Dotun revealed. “Even three days
before that time, some guys at the gym jokingly told him that he should
pray for death to be far away from him. They even sang a sorrowful song
for him and poured sand on his body. Nobody expected that three days
later, what appeared like a joke would come to pass.
“In fact, some days before his death,
his dressing suddenly changed. He began to look extra-ordinarily good
and different, as if he knew he might never have the chance to do so. We
are indeed pained by his death,” he said.
According to findings by our
correspondent, Oyinfade and his friend had staked N10, 000 each for the
bizarre bet that would later end his life. The victim is known to have
engaged in other forms of crazy bets and so saw the latest one as
nothing compared to obstacles he had conquered in the past. A bottle of
the herbal beverage he took which costs N350 each, contains 43 per cent
alcohol volume.
A medical doctor, Lanre Adedeji, says
consuming excessive alcohol at a time, especially five bottles
containing 43 per cent concentration each, is capable of not only
damaging the liver and causing nervous breakdown, but also leading to
heart attack resulting in death eventually.
But the young father of two putting the
economic benefits above the harm the drinks could do to him, paid the
ultimate price for engaging in such risky gamble. His death leaves the
Oyinfade family burying another child after the loss of two others in
the past. The household is now left with Taiwo and Idowu.
“Our mother is heartbroken by the news.
She hasn’t stopped crying ever since she was told. The wound created by
the loss of two of my siblings in the past had yet to be fully healed
when death now took Prosper away as well. The entire family is indeed
devastated by the incident,” Taiwo, the victim’s eldest surviving
sibling, told our correspondent amid tears.
But shocking and crazy as it sounds,
engaging in bizarre forms of bets such as downing huge volumes of
alcohol, have become a rising trend across the country in recent times.
While some players of such dangerous gambles have managed to escape with
minimal damage, for the majority, such attempts have often ended in
death, throwing their families and friends into an endless season of
mourning.
In May 2015 for example, a security man,
simply identified as Thompson, lost his life after drinking a bottle of
a popular alcoholic drink after smoking five sticks of cigarettes in
two minutes during a bet with a friend.
The incident, which happened in the
Agege area of Lagos, left many shocked to their marrows. The victim’s
competitor would have paid for everything he consumed if he had won the
bet.
“I tried to stop him but he drank it in
less than two minutes, smoked two sticks of cigarettes and decided to
leave. His competitor called him back to smoke the remaining three. As
soon as he finished the fifth stick, he became uncomfortable,
staggering, sweating profusely and breathing heavily as he walked away.
He vomited several times and later died at about 8:00pm in his room,”
Earnest Joseph, a friend of the deceased, said.
Two months later in July 2015, a
middle-aged man from Imo State identified as Chucks, died after
consuming 20 sachets of an alcoholic drink in a N500 bet with a shop
owner.
The deceased, said to be a barber, was
married with a child and lived along Ngwa Road area of Aba, Abia State,
at the time of the incident.
Similarly, in October 2015, a
25-year-old man, Ahmed Aderisekola, reportedly died in the Marina area
of Lagos after consuming 16 bottles of a popular brand of dry gin during
a bet with a friend. Whoever could consume the highest number was going
to be handed a financial reward the two had agreed upon. In the race to
clinch the prize, Aderisekola, determined and desperate, slumped and
died shortly after emptying the 16th bottle. He had overstretched his
resolve and staying power. Rather than clinch it, he paid the prize.
Interestingly, the phenomenon,
disturbing as it is, is not limited to Nigeria – it is a trend that
continues to record patronage in other parts of the world, too.
Psychologist, Festus Oniwonlu, explains
that engaging in bizarre and dangerous forms of betting could have dire
consequences for the mental and general well being of a person.
According to him, the desperation to
meet up with the expectations of such contests could result in anxiety
which in turn could lead to a host of psychological problems including
depression and incoherence.
Sociologist, Damiete George, told Saturday PUNCH
that except factors pushing individuals to engage in bets capable of
claiming their lives were addressed, the trend might continue to be on
the increase across the country.
“The underlying factor fuelling such
insane bets is usually poverty and the deprivation it subjects people
to. If you look at it critically, you’ll realise that these guys don’t
really enjoy consuming all that alcohol, they only do it because of the
gains attached to such bets which, in my opinion, isn’t worth the risk,
torture and trauma they subject themselves to.
“Our society as it is has made survival
very difficult for majority of her citizens and so any little avenue to
get food on the table, people rush at it without necessarily minding the
risk. But if issues fuelling hunger and extreme deprivation can be
critically addressed, not many people would want to risk their lives for
paltry rewards by engaging in bets that can claim their lives,” he
said.
Oyinfade, the latest victim of this
disturbing phenomenon, has since been buried in his native Abeokuta. His
young wife and two little sons must continue their journey without him.
It is a sad tale for the entire household.
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