As it was towards the end of last year, when there was a massive flow of blood in different parts of the country due to varying reasons, so it was in the first quarter of 2012, as there was a harvest of deaths from different parts of the country. Sulaimon Olanrewaju reports.
Road carnage
ON Tuesday, January 17, 2012, Mr Richard Mofe Damijo, a notable actor and Delta State commissioner for Culture and Tourism, was involved in a very serious road accident in Warri, Delta State as a truck was said to have rammed into his sports utility vehicle (SUV). However, he escaped with minor injuries although his driver had to be taken into intensive care unit. The SUV was damaged beyond repairs.
Today, RMD, as the actor is popular known, is alive and well and in a position to regale his listeners with how close he was to dying in a road accident. But not many people are this fortunate. In the first quarter of the ongoing year, hundreds of lives were lost to road carnage within the country. The joy of witnessing the new year was turned into mourning for some families as early as the fourth day of the new year when 10 people travelling from Lagos to Edo State, died in an accident after Okada town.
The accident, which occurred around 12.45pm, involved a lone 18-seater Toyota Hiace bus, which was said to have skidded off the road following a tyre burst.
Then the following day six people lost their lives in a road accident along Gusau-Magami road in Gusau Local Council Area of Zamfara State. Twenty eight others also sustained varying degrees of injuries and had to be hospitalised.
The accident occurred sequel to the loss of control of the vehicle by the driver. The 40-passenger bus afterward veered into a bush.
On January 22, 19 persons travelling along the Sagamu-Benin expressway were burnt to death in an auto crash involving a commercial bus and a trailer. According to eyewitnesses, the bus drove against the traffic to beat a traffic build-up and collided with an oncoming trailer. The collision caused the bus to go up in flames and all the passengers in the bus as well as the driver of the trailer died in the process.
In two separate accidents in different parts of the country, at least 50 people were killed. The road carnages, involved a head on collision between two passenger buses and a trailer ramming into stranded vehicles. While one of the accidents happened on Azare-Potiskum road, the other one took place at Onitsha, killing 32 and 18 persons respectively. In the accident on Azare-Potiskum road, the drivers and all the passengers in the buses were killed. The Onitsha accident occurred when a moving trailer was evading a road block and ran into some other vehicles including bystanders.
In another accident, 32 people were burnt to death on Thursday, Feb 16 when two buses collided at Kuskure, Bauchi State. The accident occurred when the two buses belonging to the state-run transport company collided at a road construction site and burst into flames.
On Thursday, February 23, no fewer than four persons were killed while seven others sustained serious injuries in three separate road crashes in Ijebu Ode and Ijebu East Local Government areas of Ogun State.
The first accident occurred at Yatoyo, Benin-Ore Expressway in Ijebu-East where four passengers died following a head-on collision between a Volvo truck and a Benz truck.
The second crash took place at Mobalufon in Ijebu Ode, leaving three people critically injured, while the third accident, in which four people were severely wounded, occurred at Odogbolu area of the Sagamu–Benin Expressway.
It was a tragic end for a family of seven that was fleeing from their base in Damaturu, the Yobe State capital, because of the incessant Boko Haram attacks.
The victims, members of Steven Offia family from Awhum in Udi Local Council, Enugu State, were crushed to death by a trailer while returning to their home town on Tuesday, February 2 to escape another attack by the dreaded Islamic sect.
The private car in which the family was travelling was said to have collided with a trailer coming from the opposite direction at Otukpo in Benue State.
Offia, who was a panel beater and spare parts dealer in Yobe State, his wife Nneka, four children – three boys and one girl as well as their house maid were involved in the fatal auto crash. Only the second son of the family, identified as Chibuzor, survived the crash.
In a very pathetic sad event, no fewer than 10 people died on Monday, February 20, in an auto crash on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway when an 18-seater Toyota bus ran into a stationary articulated lorry.
The bus was said to have been coming from Kebbi State and was heading to Lagos when the accident happened at a junction known as Straight Way, at Isara-Remo, on the expressway.
Again, about 10 people died on Friday, March 1 at the Otedola Estate on the Lagos/Ibadan Expressway when five vehicles, including a trailer, ran into some oil pipes lying on the road.
The trailer was the first vehicle to run into the oil pipes at about 6 am causing the trailer to trip to the left side. But there were two vehicles on that side and as the trailer fell, it fell on the two vehicles; a car and a bus and killed all the occupants.
In a very tragic incident, 18 graduates of the Imo State University, Owerri, died in an auto crash on Thursday, March 9 night.
They were on their way to the National Youth Service Corps camp in Taraba State for their orientation programme as part of Batch ‘A’ corps members.
They were said to have picked up their call-up letters from their university late and in order to meet the deadline for resumption in camp, they decided to make the journey by night.
In Ekiti State, the membership and leadership of the state chapter of the Nigeria Union of Local Government Employees (NULGE) were thrown into mourning as the chairman of the chapter, Mr. Ayo Afolalu, and four others died in a road accident along Owo-Benin road. This was on Tuesday, March 27.
Afolalu, who alongside his driver, Personal Assistant and two unidentified National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) members, were on an official trip to Benin, Edo State at the instance of NULGE, when the incident occurred a few kilometres to Benin City.
On Thursday, March 29, an accident involving a truck carrying 119 passengers occurred along the Kaduna-Abuja highway killing 16 people. The truck was said to be heading for Lagos.
Air mishaps
The Nigerian airspace was safe in the first quarter of the year as one ugly incident occurred. The incident, involving the Deputy Inspector General of the Police Haruna John and three others, happened on March 14, a week after Haruna was decorated as a DIG. Their helicopter, in which they were carrying out surveillance over the city of Jos, crashed into a house at Kabong on the outskirts of Jos.
The helicopter was on its way from Jos to Abuja and crashed near a school.
Witnesses said they watched the helicopter as it appeared to stall in the air before heading downwards.
Boko Haram attacks
Arguably, Boko Haram attacks are responsible for the highest number of violent deaths in the country in the first quarter of 2012.
The first Boko Haram onslaught in the year came on January 5 when six worshippers were killed and 10 others wounded as Boko Haram gunmen struck at a church in Gombe.
The following day was a twin attack. It was the turn of Mubi town in Adamawa State to have a taste of Boko Haram bitter pill as Boko Haram men shot dead 17 Christian mourners in the town. The sect also killed eight worshippers in a gun attack on a church in Yola.
Then on January 7, three Christian poker players were shot dead and seven others wounded by Boko Haram men in Biu, Borno State.
Damaturu, Yobe State, was next on the attack list as Boko Haram gunmen attacked a beer parlour, killing eight, including five police officers and a teenage girl, in Damaturu, Yobe State
Four Christians who were travelling from Maiduguri to their hometown in the South East were shot dead by Boko Haram gunmen in Potiskum, Yobe State as they stopped their car to refuel on January 11.
Then on January 13, Boko Haram killed four and injured two others, including a police officer, in two separate attacks on drinking joints in Adawama and Gombe states.
Four days later, the sect killed two soldiers at a military checkpoint in Maiduguri.
The people of Kogi State were shaken by the news of an attack by Boko Haram on February 15.
Members of the sect had invaded the Koton Karfe Prisons in Kogi, killing a warder and freeing their detained colleagues.
The gunmen numbering over 20 broke into the prisons with dynamite after shooting dead the warder on guard duty.
Some other security men at the prison were reportedly injured.
Perhaps the worst attack by Boko Haram was the one that took place on January 20 in Kano when the sect set the city ablaze with multiple bombings and shootings, which claimed over 128 lives. The bombings targeted eight police stations and immigration offices, including a regional police headquarters and the state police headquarters.
But despite the high casualty rate, the sect was not done. On Monday, February 20, Boko Haram struck again as its men opened fire and set off bombs at a market in Maiduguri on Monday, killing at least 30 people including children and women.
Within a week, the sect attacked Maiduguri again setting ablaze classrooms and the headmaster’s office at Gomari Costain Primary School.
On February 25, Boko Haram gunmen killed 14 people as it razed a Divisional Police headquarters during a night raid in Gombe metropolis.
It was the turn of Jos to have another wave of Boko Haram attack as the Church of Christ in Nigeria, Jos was attacked. The attack left at least six people dead.
On February 28, the sect attacked and raided a bank in Bauchi and killed three policemen during an attack on a police station.
Communal clashes
Another major cause of death in the period under consideration is communal clashes.
The nation woke up in the new year to the news of a communal clash between two neighbouring communities in Ebonyi State. the clash which was over a disputed parcel of land left over 50 people dead.
But the warring communities were not done yet as there was another attack which resulted in the killing of nine people.
On February 4, there was a blood bath at Nkpor in Anambra State as rival faction of the community association clashed over the collection of levies from traders. The clash left 10 people killed.
On March 15, over 40 houses were razed and several persons injured in a communal conflict that broke out at Agboughul village in Makurdi Local Government Area of the state. This was shortly after suspected Fulani herdsmen killed 43 persons, leaving 15 villages desolate.
Then in Taraba State on March 18, no fewer than 15 persons were killed in a clash between Fulani herdsmen and Tiv farmers in Takum Local Government Area of the state.
The clash was sequel to the eating of some crops in a farm by some cows.
The cows were said to have been led to graze on the farmland by their shepherds despite reported warnings.
In annoyance, the farmers attacked the cattle rearers.
The attack led to the missing of some cows and a shepherd.
The herdsmen launched a retaliatory attack on eight Tiv villages, including Agbaaye, Ayu, Dooshima, Gboko-Kpaake and Mbakiriki in which 15 persons were killed.
Cult clashes
Then cult clashes have also been responsible for a number of violent deaths in the country.
The first cult clash in the year occurred in Makurdi, Benue State as about 10 persons were killed on the New Year day when cult groups clashed.
Three persons were killed in Wadata, while one person was killed in Ndemekpe area of the capital city.
Cult violence in Wurukum and some other areas in Makurdi claimed six lives.
On January 4, a night clash between two rival cults on Ondo Road in Ijebu-Ode Local Government Area of Ogun State left three people dead.
The three were killed at different places within the metropolis in the renewed battle for supremacy between Aiye and Eiye cults. While two of the deceased were killed directly opposite Damola’s car wash on Ondo Road, the corpse of the third person was found at Wasinmi Primary School, Imepe Area of the town.
Then in Benin, Edo State, no fewer than eight persons were killed in cult war between rival groups in the first six days of the year.
The clash was between Eiye and the Neo-Black Movement of Africa, aka Black Axe, confraternities.
culled from tribune.com
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