The Delta State Police Command has declared a 50-year-old Ifeanyi Nweke Odum & others wanted in connection with the same-sex wedding raided by security operatives in Warri in August 2023.

Odum, according to sources, hails from one of the communities in Ika North-East Local Government Area of the state and was reportedly among the attendees at the controversial ceremony, which took place on August 27, 2023, at Tecbolus Hotel, off Refinery Road in Ekpan.

The event, said to have been a wedding between two men identified as Daniel Pius and Maxwell Ohwionowho, drew members of the LGBTQ community from different parts of Warri. Midway into the reception, police officers stormed the venue and arrested several guests while others fled in confusion.

According to security sources, Odum managed to escape by blending in with transporters outside the venue. However, his name later appeared during police questioning of suspects arrested at the scene. Investigators subsequently listed him as one of the individuals wanted for questioning over alleged involvement in the gathering, which authorities described as a violation of the Same-Sex Marriage Prohibition Act.

Community sources said Odum’s situation became more complicated when news of the raid filtered back to his hometown. Residents, already displeased with him for previously refusing to take up a hereditary chief-priest role after his father’s death, reportedly accused him of bringing “disrepute” to the community.

Tensions escalated toward the end of the year as mobs angrily attempted to burn Odum’s house in Warri based on false information that he had sneaked into the building. They wrongly mistook his colleague for him and set the house on fire. Odum’s colleague, who was rescued from the burning house after neighbours confirmed that it was not Odum who entered the building, later died a week after at the government hospital as a result of burns sustained beyond treatment.

With no house left to return to, Odum was said to have moved through different cities, including Benin and Lagos, in an attempt to save his life and have hope to live again, since it’s only the living that can make a better tomorrow.