Pastor Dele Okusaga is a professional Mortician and Mortuary Manager at the Federal Medical Centre , Idi-Aba Abeokuta. Okusaga retired as a civil servant some years back in Lagos. And somewhere in the United States of America and by sheer stroke of providence, he picked interest in a profession which many people saw as a no go area, -taking care of corpses. For over a decade, Okusaga had been doing what he knew best to do. To him, apart from serving his God, nothing elicits delight in him than handling corpses. The mortician bares his mind on this subject in an interview with Segun Orisajo.
What informed your interest in mortuary business?
Waoh! It is s long story but let me say it this way. I was a retired civil servant from the employ of Lagos State. Initially, and if I would not fantasize , it was just a desire to have a better and I went into prayer about my future and I got it right there that if I can change, I would get it better. Every man’s desire in life is to have a better life, and when opportunity came I travelled to the United Kingdom, precisely to Marhathon in search of greener pasture.
I got employed as a security man. One day, I was on break and just strolling down
the street when I saw a funeral home. I decided tom say ‘Hello’ to them there and the guy I met happened to be a Yoruba guy who cheerfully welcomed me . I told him a little story about myself how I came from a Muslim background, got converted to Christianity and how my mother was not well managed in a Lagos government mortuary. I said to myself, I would not retaliate and instead I would re-define mortuary services in the best competent and professional way.
Over there in the United Kingdom , I got training from Mortuary Science School, at Kansas University. I spent six weeks there before returning to Nigeria. I started to manage this mortuary in 2005 through a public private arrangement. To the glory of God, it had been a pleasant mutual relationship and relatives of the dead were always happy with us with the professional ways in which we handle the departed loved ones.
How do you see the dead?
Except I want to spiritualize things, death is a cross-over to rest in a better place. If a person does not die, he cannot live. Death, to me is just a crossing over from one stage of life to another.
Were you ever scared sleeping at night?
Oh my God! I had never had sleep disruption because of my contact with corpses on a daily and regular basis. I am a thorough bred professional in this business who had acquired enough of experience and training abroad and home at University College Hospital (UCH) Ibadan. This is my profession and I am contented with it.
How do you feel handling corpses every day?
Oh! It’s a delight, that’s the way I will put it. Somebody said this in now a junk! Oh my beloved brother or sister is dead, when somebody dies, it becomes a monster, everybody start to run, it’s a natural scare. On my part, I would come in, package and make acceptable. I will put the lifeless body on the
slab, take the bathe of the body, embalm it and by the time the relatives will come back, you would readily see a change in their countenance, not of rejection, but of acceptance. Sometimes, some of them will say things like, “It’s like Daddy is sleeping”.
Advice to relatives of the dead on how to handle corpses
My advice will be very sharp. If at all somebody has died, the cause of the death is still there especially if it has to do with disease. The disease that killed that person does not know that that person dead. If a person dies of tuberculosis for example, just a mere cough or infect the next person spit into the air can infect the other person.
When you carry such a body , you must be extra careful and don’t do things out of emotion. Because of things like that , we don’t engage in home embalmment, because I believe such practice is being done by quacks. Every profession has its quacks , and you know that people want to do thing s at a cheaper rate not minding the risks associated with such acts. Here I don’t do it and I discourage it a lot because of the fact that it is not medically safe to embalm at home.
How profitable is the business?
Let me say that mortuary service is not a
place where you make quick money. Although it is a steady business, you cannot forecast and based your finances on the business. Ah! let me say that on mortuary per se , there might not be much gain their, rather on the funeral arrangements such as undertaking funeral, selling of caskets, renting out of hearse . Mortuary services is not a quick money business or the type that comes suddenly like a rushing wind , but it could be a steady source of income.
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