More revelations emerged yesterday on last weekend tragedy in Ibeno Beach, beside the Qua Iboe Terminal of Exxonmobil,where a Skye Bank Manager, Ubong Ekpe, and his younger brother, Francis, were swallowed in the full glare of their family members by the sea.
Charles Ekpe, the younger brother of the late banker told Sunday Telegraph that the family had gone to the Beach on the fateful Sunday for a family reunion but what started well for the six couples ended in the form of double tragedy.
“We actually thought of going to Le’ Meridian Hotel, but later opted for the beach to save cost. We are a family of six boys and six girls, with lots of kids. Our wives had cooked choice foods and brought to the beach. We arrived at 3pm and settled down to the party. We ate and drank and partied with our kids playing around the sandy beach.
“The men, six of us decided to play football along the shore of the beach and I was the first to enter the ocean to wash my sandfilled body before I was joined by my brothers. “Ubong, (the banker) was afraid of the ocean and he only stood by the bank with water below his knees to clean up when suddenly the ground upon which he was standing carved in and swallowed him. He was covered by the ocean.
“Next, I saw struggling with the ocean currents, my younger brother, Francis, who was behind me and in a jiffy too, the ocean carried him away. All these happened within few seconds before the family members who were playing and dancing around the sea shores,” Charles said. “Forget about the stories making rounds, we knelt beside the ocean cried till 8pm and prayed for the ocean to throw them out but nothing happened. Ubong’s wife cried uncontrollably.
She was driven to the beach by her husband and there was nobody to drive her and the children back to Uyo in their vehicle. We went round begging until somebody offered to drive the family back in their car since all of us came with our different cars,” he said. Ubong Ekpe, who was married with four lovely children, was until his sudden death the Manager of Skye Bank, Nwaniba Road Branch, Uyo, while his younger brother Francis, a teacher is said to be preparing for his marriage soon.
The death of the fair-skinned manager and that of his brother has thrown the family, friends and colleagues into deep mourning with aged father lamenting the rumor making round that he collapsed and died out of shock. He said “the next day, we returned to Ibeno and approached the village head on what to do to get their corpses and he assured us that the corpses will soon float to the shoreline. We were still there when we were told that their bodies were by the sea shore.�
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