Ayoka Buhari’s Corpse Goes Missing From Morgue

It was a pathetic situation when the body of 55-year-old Ayoka Buhari was nowhere to be found in the morgue during her burial yesterday, Thursday, October 22. According to The Punch, Mrs Buhari had died on Wednesday, October 14, following a brief illness in Mowe, Ogun state. Her children had taken her body to TOS Funerals, a morgue which is managed by Gbagada General Hospital.
                                                             

Family and well-wishers of the deceased had done the wake-keeping and it was time to have her interment at around 8am when it was noticed that her body was no longer at the morgue. It was said to have been mistakenly swapped for another.

”The family was asked to come for the corpse at 8.30am today (Thursday), but when we got there, we discovered that they were not ready for us. Later, they said the woman’s husband must show up before they release her corpse. Her daughter, however, insisted on seeing the corpse. They brought out a corpse and she raised the alarm that it was not her mother,” Folorunsho Adeoluwa, a relative said. Adeolu also threatened legal action against the owners of the morgue.

When a worker at the morgue, Femi, was interviewed, he said that the corpse was mistaken for another one. He further said the corpse was wrongly tagged from the beginning because the bodies were brought-in at the same time. He speculated that Mrs Buhari’s body had been given to another man who lost his wife. When the first family rushed down to Matori, Mushin, to meet the man who was suspected to have taken the corpse, he had buried it.

“The man said he had buried his wife and he could not exhume her body unless the family showed him the picture of the corpse they have in the mortuary. We all rushed back to the morgue and took a picture of the corpse that the hospital wanted to give us. The woman’s husband has not returned from the place,” Adeoluwa added.

A spokesperson for the morgue, Olumide, said the corpse had been found and the family was going for the burial at around 7pm.

“There was just a mix up, which has been sorted out. I am with the family; they are driving ahead of me. We are on our way to bury the corpse. The matter has been resolved,” he said.