By Dayo Johnson

WHAT an irony. His father died when he and his siblings were toddlers. Now he too is dead leaving behind three toddlers.

Sadly, Segun George Modupe aged 47  failed to sleep even for a day in a building he laboured all his life to build and which had reach 85 percent completion.

Late Modupe

His plans according to family source was to celebrate the coming Christmas and the new year in the new house with his family. But that is not to be as man proposes but God disposes.What a life.

Speaking with Vanguard, the wife who could only muster few words said she had lost the love of her life having courted for 10 years before walking the aisle many years ago.

Ironically it was his remains that are resting  permanently  outside the building he started years back.

Like all weekend husbands he used to work outside the state where his family resides, Segun, a banker with Heritage Bank in Otun-Ekiti in Moba Local Government area of Ekiti State left four other members of his immediate family including the wife Agnes and their three children Omogbolahan, Omofolarin and Oluwatimilehin that Monday morning without any premonition that  by Friday when he was expected to return to reunite with his family, it was his corpse that would be sent back home.

Vanguard gathered that, that Thursday at about 3pm when the traffic was high in the bank, the armed robbers mingled with the customers and gained entry into the banking hall.

They, after positioning themselves in strategic points in the banking hall ordered both the customers and bank officials to go on their knees after which they equally ordered them to lay prostrate with their faces to the floor.

Segun who was said to be in the banking hall obeyed the instructions.

But the leader of the robbery gang who was said to be furious because the money they met in the bank strong room was below his expectation reportedly started shooting indiscriminately and one of the bullets hit and killed Segun.

Vanguard could not confirm if he died on the spot or not. But the robbers reportedly escaped with their loot even after raiding customers who came to lodge money.

Without saying goodbye to his lovely wife, kids , over 70 year-old-mother and other siblings, Segun travelled to the great beyond no thanks to the hot bullet fired at him by one of the armed robbers that invaded his bank on that ill fated Thursday, a day before he was to reunite with his family.

A week after he was gruesomely murdered by the suspected hoodlums  his remains were buried in  his uncompleted building in Oba-Ile area of the State just as tears flowed freely from family, friends, neighbours who were expecting him to move into the new house soon.

It was like a festival of weeping and wailing as the wife Agnes, his three children wept uncontrollably when the deceased was buried.

The sisters, friends and colleagues could not control their emotions as they burst into tears at the grave side. Agnes who was sobbing as she spoke with Vanguard said “I don’t know what to say; I don’t know where to start and where to end it.

“ My lovely Segun is gone he was a loving and caring husband; he was my friend, my brother, my father and mother. They took him away from me, I leave everything to God.  We spoke about an hour before he was shot. I  reminded him of the children school fees.

“ But Instead of coming home to fulfil his promise of bringing the school fees it was his corpse that was brought home after he was hit by bullet of the hoodlums who attacked his bank.

“When we spoke that day, he did not have any premonition of death. We spoke in the afternoon when I wanted to go and pick the children from school. He asked me to take care of his children; he said he would be back the following day.

“I told him everything about their school fees and he said I should call the Bursar of the school, I gave the phone to the Bursar and he spoke with him assuring that  he would bring the school fees on his return.

‘’They have killed the better part of me. Where do I start from now. Who will take care of our three children. God God God.’’

How to inform the late Segun’s over 70-year-mother  is now a big task for the deceased elders sisters as he visits his mother whenever  he visited his family in Akure.