A burial ceremony in honour of the former Cross River
State Commissioner for Youths and Sports, Mr. Raymond Obeten, was
disrupted on Saturday in Obubra Local Government Area, when a giant
lizard dropped from the rooftop.
Obeten, who was the immediate past commissioner in
the ministry, died on August 29 at the University of Calabar Teaching
Hospital from liver complications.
At the burial ceremony, several people scampered to
safety with some screaming on the top of their voices when the lizard
fell and dashed towards the crowd.
The incident brought the burial proceedings to a halt
as the cleric who was conducting the farewell mass was taken aback and
had to step aside to ask what the matter was.
However, one of the villagers, who identified himself
as Mr. Obongha, said the crowd which consisted of relatives of the
deceased and his kinsmen from Adun and neighbouring villages, were
afraid because they read superstitious meaning into the incident.
“For a diabolical society like ours, the death of a
person is always attributed, not to an ailment but one person or an
amorphous factor. So, people get scared when something strange, no
matter how ordinary, occurs during burial,” he said.
Also, the younger brother to the deceased, Mr. Otaba
Obeten, alluded to this when he said the demise of his elder brother was
“mysterious and its source could not be far from the tussle currently
going on in the village.”
But the commotion did not bother the state Deputy
Governor, Mr. Efiok Cobham, who was already seated and awaiting the
arrival of Governor Liyel Imoke.
In his farewell message, Imoke eulogised his former aide, saying he took his job seriously.
Imoke said, “Ray Power, as we called him in the State
Executive Council, was close to me. He was one person that had great
sense of humour because during debate he would not make his speech
without a joke that would send us all laughing, no matter how serious
the matter was.”
The governor called on the family and the people of
Adun, the deceased immediate community, to remain united no matter what
differences that might exist between them.
He consoled the deceased’s wife, Helen, and his two
children, David and Odam, and asked them to remain humble and focused so
that their father’s expectation and desire for them would come to pass.
It is not the tussle going on in the village that cause this, it shows the kind of person the Man is. This simply means his character on earth is that of a lizard, Don't feel sorry for him. It's a lesson to all of us.
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