The death of Mrs. Uju Ndubuisi Chukwu, deputy director general, Chartered Insurance Institute of Nigeria (CIIN) in South Africa is "unnatural", according an autopsy report by Department of Health, Republic of South Africa.
The autopsy report stated that Mrs. Chukwu died of “Unnatural Cause Consistent with Strangulation”.
This lays to rest the initial belief that she died in her sleep overnight.
Mrs. Chukwu, died during a Pan African conference in South Africa in her hotel room at Emperor Palace Hotel, Johannesburg.
Unnatural death is a category used by coroners or medical examiners and vital statistics specialists for classifying all human deaths not properly describable as death by natural causes.
Hence, it would include events such as accident, drug overdose, attack by an animal, mob killing, execution, homicide, medical error, misadventure, State-sponsored mass murder, suicide and war.
Meanwhile, the report from South African authorities has thrown the insurance industry in the country and across the continent into confusion as the abridged death certificate provided by the South African authorities was silent on the type of unnatural cause that killed Mrs. Chukwu.
Most alarming to the insurance fraternity is the fact that the South African authorities have also said that CCTV footage provided by the hotel management to the police showed no one entered the deceased’s room despite the autopsy report that her death was unnatural.
