A young man, identified simply as Lanre, is currently held at an undisclosed police station in Agege Local Government Area of Lagos State after he allegedly inflicted deep cuts on his half-brother in a brawl over Christmas allowance from their father.
Lanre and Femi are both students of a polytechnic in Ogun State where they study Accountancy and Mechanical Engineering respectively. Femi’s mother reportedly divorced his father a coup of years back, while Lanre’s mother is said to be the one looking after the two young men.
The father of the two brothers, a chief accountant with a new generation bank on Lagos Island, had recently relocated to the Federal Capital Territory on transfer, leaving Lanre’s mother and the kids all at home.
But on Christmas Eve, hell was let loose in the family when the two brothers engaged themselves in bloody fight leading to one sustaining deep knife cut and being hospitalised. It was gathered that Lanre was still in school when their father was leaving for Abuja on Monday, December 17, 2013. Only Femi had returned home for the Christmas break.
Lanre’s mother, Gladys, was said to have accompanied her husband to Abuja but was billed to return home for the Christmas. By when she returned, Gladys met the home in shambles as her son had almost snuffed life out of his half-brother.
It was learnt that while leaving for Abuja, their father left some amount of money for the two young men to celebrate the festive period with. It was gathered that a sum of N15, 000 each was left for the two brothers, but because Lanre did not return early from school, the man chose to give Femi his brother’s money for onward transfer to him on his return.
It was said that when Lanre came back from school, Femi only gave him N11, 000. A family friend also told Saturday Mirror that Femi later confessed to have deliberately withheld the balance of N4, 000 to offset the debt of same amount Lanre owed him.
But when Lanre discovered that the amount his father told him on telephone was not the same thing Femi remitted to him, he chose to go confrontational. When he demanded for the money and Femi did not bulge, he decided to engage him in a fight.
In the end, Lanre reportedly stabbed his brother several times on the chest before he fled home after seeing the damage he had done. But for a neighbour who noticed some blood stains on Lanre’s cloths as he ran out of the house, and who decided to check on the boys after the eldest ran out of the house, Femi might have died.
The neighbour reportedly phoned Gladys who responded that she was just landing at the Ikeja domestic airport. It was reported that the neighbour mobilised some other people to rush the young man to the hospital after he had lost so much blood.
Speaking to Saturday Mirror the neighbour who does not want to be mentioned, expressed worry over what could have come over Lanre, whom he described as a gentle young man. “All I could say is that I noticed blood all over Lanre’s clothes as he ran out of the house. When an elder living opposite their house called at him, he did not answer then I sensed that something was wrong.
That was why I chose to check what was going on. When I knocked at the door, the two young daughters of the house were only crying but I was shocked when I saw Femi wailing on the floor in the pool of his blood. I had to quickly call their mother who told me that she was just landing at the airport.
I then mobilised some men in the area to take the bleeding boy to the hospital,” the neighbour added.
When asked to comment on what could have made the two brothers fight dirty like that, Gladys claimed that the action of her son must have been out of provocation, but maintained that their father had been informed of the development and was already on his way to Lagos to settle the matter.
“It is really an unfortunate incident, but my husband is already informed and he will be in Lagos with the next available flight. The joy in the whole matter is that Femi is hale and hearty and the matter would be resolved.” She, however, declined knowledge of the whereabouts of Lanre.
.jpg)
