Concerns Grow Over Cause Of Death Of Polio Expert Dr Chukwuemeka Agbo In Jordan
Concerns rise over the mysterious death of Nigerian WHO official, Dr. Chukwuemeka Agbo, a polio expert, who was reportedly murdered in Amman, Jordan, despite WHO’s claim of a fall from his apartment roof in June 2024.
There is growing concern over the cause of death of a Nigerian mediial practitioner, and official of the World Health Organisation, WHO, Dr Chukwuemeka Agbo, 45, in Amman, Jordan, earliier in June this year.
Agbo, who was an expert in polio disease, was said to have been murdered on June 9, 2024, in his apartment even as , the WHO reportedly informed his relations in Nigeria, that the deceased fell from the roof of the three - storey building he was staying in.
He worked for the international agency as a polio technical officer.
According to family sources, Dr Agbo, was a valued member of its workforce for 10 years, supporting immunization, polio eradication, and Ebola outbreak responses in the African and Eastern Mediterranean regions, even as he joined the Polio Eradication team in Amman early February 2024.
Family sources said that a few weeks prior to his death, Agbo had expressed deep concerns over his safety, due to alleged persistent hostile attitudes of some of his WHO colleagues since he took up his position in the WHO office in Jordan.
However, in the early morning of Sunday, June 9, this year, he was reportedly found killed killed at the back of the first floor of his apartment.
At the time of notification, the family was told by WHO in Amman that he fell from the roof of the three-storey building to the ground - but the story turned out to be different from the information received by the family while in Amman, Jordan, following further enquiries.
Agbo’s brother, Jideofor, who traveled to Amman from London to identify the corpse of the beteceased, said that, when he saw Emeka’s corpse, , "It didn’t look like someone who fell from any height."
He further said that the injuries on the body of his brother looked like someone who had been attacked, adding also that, two autopsies had been conducted to ascertain what actually happened to the deceased.
"One of the autopsies was conducted by the Jordanian authorities, and the second was conducted in Nigeria at the request of the family.
“The reputable pathologists confirmed that my brother’s skull was shattered by blunt force trauma and conclusively ruled out suicide or accidental death.
"We have requested the initial report from WHO Jordan on how they concluded that my brother fell from the roof of the three-storey building to the ground. They are yet to respond to this request.
"The lack of communication from the Jordanian authorities also has been a significant challenge, and we are concerned that the delay may result in loss of crucial evidence," Jideofor lamented.
Family lawyer, Femi Falana, SAN, who spoke also, believes that based on the autopsy findings, the cause of Dr. Agbo’s death was homicide and called for justice. Falana further noted that the doctors examined the body and established a case of massive intracranial hemorrhage (bleeding within the brain or its surrounding tissues), multiple skull fractures, and injuries that could not have arisen from a single fall.
According to him, “The autopsy suggested consistent trauma, and interestingly, the findings of the pathologists here were reconfirmed by the Jordanian autopsy in their investigation. The World Health Organization should have investigated the incident even without demand from the family. I wrote to the Director General of the WHO on behalf of the family, and I’m yet to receive a response from him."
Before joining the Polio Eradication Programme in Amman, Dr Agbo served as the GPEI Coordinator for Kenya, managing the response to cholera and polio outbreaks.
From February 2022 to December 2023, he served as the GPEI Coordinator in Malawi, where he led the outbreak responses to the importation of wild polio virus type 1, measles, and cholera. For 10 years, he served WHO and the Gates Foundation and successfully led large-scale responses to disease outbreaks in the Horn of Africa.
Before joining WHO, Dr. Agbo worked in the private sector and with a non-profit organization as a medical officer in the Netherlands and Nigeria. Married with three children, Emeka hailed from Neke in Isi-Uzo local government area of Enugu state.
Citizens are of the opinion that the Federal Government of Nigeria through the Diaspora Commission should step in to find out from the WHO in Amman, how they arrived at the submission that Dr. Agbo fell from the balcony, which has been prioved false as his autopsy has proved otherwise. Medical health practitioners are also afraid that if Agbo’s murder was left unresolved, the lives of Nigerians embarking on foreign medical missions might as well be in jeopardy.
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