The younger brother of Izu Joseph, the (3SC) footballer who was shot dead last week, has come out to deny the allegations that he was killed in a cultist shrine.
He said contrary to the reports making rounds about his brother’s death, Joseph was rather killed by a stray bullet by officers of the JTF who were on a raid to shoot criminals.
Izu Reuben Jr., the brother, recounted how Joseph was relaxing around his family compound in Okarki when officers in the pursuit of criminals, shot him in the leg.
Despite his plea to be spared, and the club ID card he showed them for identification, they still shot him dead, and later on dragged his body to the waterfront.
He also claimed that the JTF military tried to hide their act by covering the blood trail with sand in the process.
According to Izu Reuben Jr., “I was in the river and heard a gun shot and his screams, I ran towards where he was shot and was watching it all while taking cover.”
“He was screaming telling a soilder he is a footballer from 3SC, then the second soldier came, you know soldiers are not learned, they first shot him and was still listening to his plea if he was really a footballer, but a second soldier walked in and angrily shot him dead.”
He further explained that it was in the course of going through his phone that they realised he was really a professional footballer. They then tried to cover up their actions by throwing his body into the river.
Izu Reuben also revealed that contrary to military reports, the soilders went to a confidence building and hyped themselves threatening to kill as many people as possible.
He further explained that their purpose of going there was to enable them to build up their confidence to attack people.
Izu denied the presence of a shrine in his village as speculated by the JTF, saying that the military had tried to tag his brother with a crime he was innocent of and also pretended to protect the common man.
The brother to the deceased said he is seeking for justice for his late brother, and calling on the government to bring the perpetrators to face the consequences of their actions because his brother was not supposed to be shot after he had surrendered to the military men.
