Found this inspiring story of this Nigerian police officer, Edward Eze
Onoriode who returned a woman's purse with ATM cards containing N200m
and a necklace worth N1.8 million. Read the amazing story as shared by
him on his Facebook wall below...
"I was at Ikeja shopping mall two days ago on duty where I recovered a
missing purse at the parking lot. The purse contained; some cash both
local and foreign currencies, recharge cards worth about N2000, nine ATM
cards, complementary cards, valuable documents, international passport,
international and local drivers license, national ID card, voters card
and a gold necklace.
I took the missing purse to the security office where
all lost but found items are being kept for the owners to claim should
in case the owners lodge a formal complaint that their items at the mall
went missing for possibly claim after identification.
At the security office where we went through all the items inside the
purse for record purpose, one of the security men told me point blank
that if he's the one that recovered the missing purse, he'd remove the
money, gold necklace and recharge card before bringing the purse to the
office for record purpose. I wasn't disappointed with his misguided
speech because that's the normal character of most Nigerians when they
recover a missing item.
Somehow, I decide to trace the owner of the purse via her complimentary
card and put a call across to her. Open receiving the call, she screamed
at the background jubilating that her missing purse has been recovered.
She drove straight to the mall, tracing me through my mobile number I
used in calling her.
When we met, she didn't mind we were in public, she gave me a warm hug
and thanked me and prayed for me. I took her to the office where the
purse was kept. She checked her purse and discovered that nothing was
missing. She was astonished. She asked me again if I was the one that
saw the item and I said yes.
She told me that she was already in the bank filling forms to block her
ATM cards. She said in those ATM cards, she have over N200m in there and
the necklace in the purse is valued at N1.8m. She also said, I just
removed a heavy burden from her neck because life would have been
miserable for her missing her international passport, international and
local drivers licence including other documents. She kept thanking me
and almost knelling down. She was awed and she told me that she least
expected a Police officer to recover a missing item containing cash and
still return that missing item intact without removing a dime out of it
mostly in this harsh economy. She kept staring at me like am a God.
To cut the long story short, she gave me some cash which I rejected. I
told her am doing my job and taking money from her for recovering her
missing purse is wrong on my part. I also made her to understand that we
can become friends and maybe in the future she can appreciate my nice
gesture to her but I won't take anything from her for doing my job at
the moment.
She became speechless and asked me which church am i attending? I smiled
and told her "am irreligious. In fact, am a freethinker" that's the
exact words I told her.
She stood their for minutes without knowing the next word to say.
Anyway, we are now friends and she just introduced me to her husband
this morning on phone. Her husband was so excited and has invited me and
my family to join them on a dinner in any of my off days.
Is good to do the right thing not because of any reward that comes with
it but because its the right thing to do.
Good morning.
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