It was supposed to be harmless childhood banter: I will chase you around the yard until I get what I want from you. But for eight-year-old Desmond Achia and 16-year-old Sonia Olia, their innocent repartee ended tragically. At about 6pm on July 5, Olia had pursued her little cousin, Achia to have a bite of cucumber which was part of the family meal for that evening. Olia possibly did not envisage that the cucumber was deadly, as she struggled to take a bite of it from her little cousin.
Soon after they ate the cucumber, both Olia and Achia started complaining of stomach pains; they slumped and died few hours later. The cucumber, which was later suspected to be poisoned, was also shared by Olia’s four other cousins identified as John Agbor (15), Grace Apuwe (15), Happiness Akor (eight) and Kenneth Isheli (10). The four of them also died soon after the meal. The six children all died at different times in the space of four hours.
The sad incident, which happened in the remote village of Amana in Becheve ward of Obanliku Local Government Area of Cross River State, also led to the death of their 65-year-old grandmother, Susan Agbor, who collapsed and died upon hearing about the shocking news. Agbor, who was not at home at the time of the incident, only returned to meet her grandchildren dying one after the other.
Amana is one of the villages located beneath the popular Obudu Cattle Ranch — an international tourist resort known for its cold climate all year round and a former host to the now defunct Obudu Mountain Race. The ill-fated incident has since left the whole community in shock as cucumber is one of the staple fruits consumed by people in the village.
The dead children were said to be under the custody of their grandmother, while their parents, who are the direct children of the late Agbor, are said to be engaged in agricultural activities in other villages. A close friend to one of the deceased, Faustina Utanga, said her late friend, Olia, had just finished taking the Senior Secondary School Certificate Examination and was waiting for her result when the incident happened.
She said, “The cucumber was alleged to have been sold to the grandmother by an unidentified person. My friend was inside the room in the compound when the grandmother shared it among her younger ones. When she came out, she asked one of the younger ones to allow her have a bite, but the young boy ran away and she (Sonia) pursued him and took the cucumber by force. She had a bite and gave it back to him, saying that it was too bitter.
“Shortly after eating it, the children started showing signs of discomfort and some went into a coma and died. She was the one who later revealed before she died in a local health centre in the community that it was the cucumber meal that caused the deaths.”
Apart from the grandmother and two other children that were buried in Amana, others were taken by their various parents to other villages for burial.