Man accused of buying human hair escape lynching

Man accused of buying human hair escapes
lynching
What exactly will make a man go from a salon
to salon collecting people’s hair in exchange for
money?
This is a question that only a 60-year-old man,
Adewale Okunade, a landlord of a house on
Segun Olatunji Street, Ijoko, Ota, Ogun State,
has its answer.
Okunade, who hails from Oyo State, narrowly
escaped being lynched on Thursday when some
people in the neighbourhood pounced on him.
They alleged that the hair was being taken to an
herbalist in Cotonou, Republic of Benin, who
uses it to prepare charms for him.
Some people said they found Okunade’s
behaviour bizarre, insisting that there was more
to his action.
It was gathered that the man had been in the
business for some years but nemesis caught up
with him on the fateful day when his ‘business
partner’, a bricklayer, gave him away.
An executive member of the Community
Development Association said Okunade
allegedly confessed that he had been buying
human hair.
According to the CDA executive, the victim said
he had been using the hair to cure himself of
festering sores on his leg.
He said the suspect denied the hair was meant
for rituals, saying he used to take the hair to an
herbalist to prepare concoctions for his sores.
He said many traditional medicine practitioners
who were there when Okunade was
apprehended, said human hair could only be
used for rituals not for curing sores.
He said, “The suspect’s partner had gone to a
barber in their neighbourhood to buy some hair.
The barber, however, refused. The suspect sent
his partner to go to the barber’s apprentice.
“When they got to the apprentice, he agreed, but
unknown to them that the barber was monitoring
their movement. The barber decided to lay
ambush for them.
“When he (barber) saw them with a cellophane
bag, he raised the alarm and many people in the
neighbourhood were drawn to the scene. By the
time they checked the contents in the bag, they
saw plenty of human hair.
“That was how the community pounced on his
partner and started questioning him about the
source of the hair. It was in the course of that
the partner said it was Okunade who sent him.
“The people moved to Okunade’s house but he
was not around. When he came back and people
related the incident to him, he left the
community the following day.
“By the time he came back, he thought the
residents would have forgotten about the
incident, but when they saw him, they mobbed
him. It was then he explained that he had sores
on his leg that refused to heal and that he had
been curing them with concoction mixed with
human hair.
“The community, not satisfied with his
explanation, decided to hand him over to the
police at Sango Police Station.”
Another resident, who craved anonymity, said,
“We have yet to come to terms with his
pedestrian explanation. As for us, he is not
saying the whole truth.
“We learnt that he pays between N200,000 and
N300,000 for each consignment of hair. You can
see that his explanation lacks the essential
elements of truth. I am also amazed that human
hair has become a cure for sores.”
The spokesman for Ogun State Police Command,
Mr. Muyiwa Adejobi, said the story was twisted
by the community.
He said the suspect had only solicited for hair
because of his festering sores.
Adejobi said, “The story was not like that. The
man (Okunade) has a sore and he said he
needed human hair to cure the sore. He had not
gotten the hair; he only solicited. The
community just raised the alarm which resulted
in the man’s car being vandalised.
“He reported to the police that his car was being
vandalised and that they wanted to kill him.
That was how the police mediated to avoid the
man being lynched.”