Residents of Soweto village in Jinja city are in shock after one of their own, a 40-year-old John Ochieng died of starvation after reportedly going two weeks without food.
According to Ochieng’s neighbors. The deceased lost his job in April 2020 and resorted to begging food for survival, but they couldn’t do much since they are also struggling to feed their families.
Ochieng got frustrated with life and decided to lock himself inside his rented room on June 24th, 2020 until today morning when he was pronounced dead.
Residents say they got to know about his death when they noticed houseflies around his door and decided to break-in, only to be welcomed by horrific scenes.
The deceased would allegedly spend days without food since he lacked sustainable income to feed himself. He had resorted to working on private farms where he would earn Shillings 1000 daily.
Ochieng was discontinued when the proprietor of the farms ran out of money to pay him.
According to David Kitamirike the Soweto block leader, the area has over 500 youthful couples who were laid off from various factories citing financial challenges caused by the lockdown.
The Officer in Charge Walukuba Police Station Mohammed Ssebuliba says a case of sudden death was reported at the station and detectives inspected the scene of crime but family members blocked them from conducting postmortem for personal reasons.
