The Case of 33 Unclaimed Dead Bodies in a Nigerian Morgue and Reflections on Lagos Real Estate Developers
Twenty-one Days to Mass Burial
In November 2023, the BBC reported that thirty-three bodies lay dead and unclaimed in the mortuary of Godfrey Okoye University’s teaching hospital in Enugu, South-East Nigeria. Some of the bodies had been lying there for eighteen years. For others, it had been ten years.
Furthermore, and with approval from Enugu’s High Court, the university announced that the bodies would receive a mass burial if they were not claimed within the next twenty-one days.
The university decided to take this step because the corpses need to be cleared to allow for building renovations.
While the story may sound surprising on the surface, unclaimed dead bodies are not as rare as one may think or hope. Unclaimed dead bodies are not a South-Eastern Nigerian phenomenon – there are many stories of unclaimed corpses across Nigeria and the rest of the world.
Unclaimed corpses in morgues can typically be grouped into two main categories: unidentified and identified-but-abandoned.
Unidentified
In terms of unknown identities, it is not possible for hospitals to contact the deceased’s relatives, who are usually responsible for funeral arrangements.
One reason why the deceased’s identity may not be known is because of the way in which they died.
In Nigeria and other countries, unclaimed corpses are often victims of road traffic accidents and crime – whereby the unidentified are brought into hospitals by strangers, including concerned passersby or police officers. So, it’s not always possible for hospital staff to identify them.
In the case of the thirty-three corpses in Enugu’s Godfrey Okoye University, fourteen of the thirty-three bodies were labelled with the same name and not all of the thirty-three had records for when they were originally brought into the mortuary, according to the university’s Chief Medical Director.
It is unclear, however, whether the duplicate names resulted from administrative shortcomings by hospital staff, from tagging the fourteen with the same placeholder names due to their unknown identities, or from some other cause.
Identified-but-abandoned
In terms of identified-but-abandoned corpses, financial constraints are a key driver.
Sometimes families are unable to afford the costs associated with claiming and burying their relatives, which can be fuelled by the demanding burial-related culture within Nigeria as well as the structure of its healthcare system, where households often make direct out-of-pocket payments for medical services.
For instance, a retrospective study on unclaimed bodies in the morgue of Nigeria’s University of Uyo Teaching Hospital found that just over 50% of unclaimed corpses were originally deposited by relatives – including the deceased’s children, parents, spouses and siblings.
In these cases, where bodies are identified-but-abandoned, experts suggest that at one point, the relatives of the deceased are likely to have registered the body at the morgue, paid initial registration fees, left the mortuary and then decided not to return given accumulating mortuary fees and medical bills, especially if the deceased had been a patient at the hospital and died in the course of treatment.
Financial constraints are often exacerbated by the perceived low status of the dead or the dead’s lack of connections with the living. In some parts of Nigerian society, the young, childless, homeless, unemployed, mentally ill and criminals can fall into these categories.
For example, of the 124 corpses unclaimed at the morgue of the Lagos University Teaching Hospital in 2021, 80% were children – aged between zero and ten years old.
Amongst some groups in Nigeria, the death of neonates can be seen as a shame, curse or punishment by a god for past actions. So, if a child dies, some parents may be reluctant to claim the child's body.
It is also worth noting that some corpses may be abandoned in hospitals given family and legal issues as well as law enforcement involvement.
Where complications or disputes arise following someone’s death - relating to inheritance or unresolved family feuds, for instance – this may delay or prevent families from claiming their dead. Similarly, if families become aware that they would need to interact with the police in order to give their dead a befitting burial, some may choose to abandon them given hesitancy towards interacting with the Nigerian police.
Real Estate Developers
Across Nigeria and the world, the topic of abandonment extends far beyond hospitals and personal relationships. From unfinished roads to incomplete buildings, some projects that begin with ceremony can end in silence.
While the economy now appears more stable, real estate developers in Lagos and across Nigeria have faced significant challenges over the past couple of years. With a high reliance on imported construction materials, the Naira fell from roughly ₦460/$ in June 2023 to ₦1,535/$ by the end of 2024. At the same time, data from Nairametrics shows that between 2023 and 2025, the average open-market price of a 50kg bag of cement more than doubled, climbing from about ₦5,000 to over ₦10,000.
Rising costs of cement, foreign exchange and construction materials forced some developers to halt projects midway. For some, this was an honest casualty of macroeconomic volatility — the numbers simply stopped adding up. For others, it exposed weak capital discipline, unrealistic pre-sales promises or outright negligence.
In response, some developers refunded buyers or restructured delivery terms. Others disappeared or continued making promises without follow-through, leaving some buyers with paperwork and prayers. In many cases, the difference comes down to the integrity, discipline and professionalism of the developer — as well as the insight and understanding of their investors. In business, shocks are part of the cycle, but when markets tighten, strong developers generally innovate, renegotiate, or refinance, often with the buy-in of informed investors. The ability to adapt responsibly under strain often separates credible developers from the rest.
For Nigerian investors living abroad, investing in reputable real estate developers is even more crucial, as they are not on the ground to monitor progress or respond quickly to challenges. At Rootstone Homes, we see our role not just as connecting diaspora investors to projects, but as helping them identify opportunities with developers who have solid reputations — especially important given the off-plan nature of the Lagos real estate market.
About Rootstone Homes
Rootstone Homes is a British–Nigerian real estate agency and consultancy focused on helping the Nigerian diaspora invest in Lagos’ real estate with trust, professionalism and greater peace of mind. Accredited by the Lagos State Real Estate Regulatory Authority (LASRERA), we bridge the gap between international buyers and Lagos’ rewarding yet intricate property landscape — mitigating risk and enabling sound, well-informed acquisition decisions.
About the Author
Naomi Chika is the Founder of Rootstone Homes, bringing together a blend of real estate, investment and legal expertise with a deep understanding of the Nigerian diaspora experience. Formerly a private equity and principal investing consultant at McKinsey & Company in London, she once solo across West Africa for five months — travelling by road from Senegal to Nigeria — to deepen her knowledge of the region.
