Looking at the passenger manifest of the Young Shall Grow Motors’ luxury bus that was consumed along with 30 passengers in the April 5, 2013 crash at Ugbogui, Edo State, one cannot but wonder at the relationship between those who have the same surnames on the manifest.
They died when a Dangote cement truck reportedly had a burst tyre and crashed into a stationary fuel tanker before exploding and consuming their oncoming luxury bus. The bus was on its way from Lagos to Enugu when its journey was abruptly terminated at Ugbogui on the Sagamu-Benin Expressway.
Saturday PUNCH went in search of some of the owners of the phone numbers listed as next of kin in the manifest. The result was heart-rending. Family members of the victims were in great pain and shock.
One of the most shocking stories was that of Nneka and Kenneth Ojielo, a couple who died in the accident. Theirs is a story that will bring tears to many eyes.
Kenneth had not seen his wife of 22 years in the last 10 years until Thursday, the day before they both perished in the crash.
Nneka’s younger brother, Ogonna Abako, told Saturday PUNCH, “Kenneth travelled to Austria in 2003 in search of greener pastures. Before he left, they already had five children. Their eldest child is 21.
“They actually got married very early. Kenneth was 26 years old when they got married while my sister was about 20 years old at the time. Everybody was joyous when we heard he was coming home.
“My sister travelled to Lagos from Enugu on Wednesday (two days before the accident). On Thursday, I took her to the airport to welcome her husband. No one could separate them when Kenneth eventually came out with his luggage. They kissed for about 15 minutes and everybody around just stood watching.”
A picture of the joyous reunion taken by Ogonna’s wife on her mobile phone at the airport showed a couple with much happiness written all over their faces.
But that joy was short-lived.
On Friday, they decided to travel to Enugu. Kenneth wanted to meet his children as soon as possible. The children too were ecstatic in Enugu as they kept calling, asking their father, whom they had not seen in the last 10 years, to get home on time.
Ogonna said, “I drove my sister and her husband to a hotel and lodged them there. The following day, I woke up early to take them to the bus park. We got to Jibowu and realised that the Ekene bus they wanted to take had already left.
“I wanted them to take a smaller bus, but Kenneth insisted he would rather board the luxury bus.”
Our correspondent learnt that the couple held hands in the bus and prayed for journey mercies as Ogonna bid them farewell, not knowing it was for the last time.
He said he called his sister’s phone at 3pm but it did not connect. He thought there was at network problem.
“When it was 6pm, my sister’s eldest child called and said she had not seen her parents. I then asked my brother to go to the Young Shall Grow park in Enugu. He was told there that only two of the company’s buses took off from Lagos that day, one from Maza Maza and one from Jibowu.
“Many families were waiting for their relations at the park too. The bus that took off from Maza Maza got to the park and that was when the passengers broke the news of the accident to waiting families. Those children will never see their father and mother again,” Abako said as he dabbed at his teary eyes.
At Mrs. Rita Chukwuemelie’s residence at No. 4, Moses Adebayo Street, Ojodu-Berger in Lagos, it was as if the whole world had come crashing down.
Chukwuemelie sat on the floor of her apartment, surrounded by four other members of the family who were consoling her.
The air was thick with grief, as the woman, who is in her 50s, bemoaned the tragedy that had hit the family.
She sighed and let out occasional sounds of agony. Her only sister, 58-year-old Rebecca Mbachu, was listed as Number 26 on the manifest provided by the Federal Road Safety Commission.
“She died with her three children. The only sibling I have in the whole world perished with her entire family,” she wailed.
Our correspondent learnt that Mbachu and her three children – Chinyere (25), Oluchukwu (12), Ebuka (6) and a niece, Mesoma, were on their way to Enugu after attending an overnight programme at the campground of the Mountain of Fire and Miracles Ministries along Lagos-Ibadan Expressway on Thursday.
Chukwuemelie told Saturday PUNCH, “When they finished the programme on Friday morning, my sister called me to ask for where they could get a bus to Enugu and I directed them to Jibowu, Lagos, where I know there are parks for buses going to the East.
“I later went to Jibowu to meet them. After we had paid their fare, Ebuka, my sister’s youngest child said, ‘Mummy, I don’t like this bus. I don’t want to board this bus’. But his mum assured him that luxury buses were safer than the smaller buses he pointed to as his choice.
“We probably would have reconsidered if they had not already got their tickets. I watched them board. Chinyere told me as they boarded that I must not forget her birthday (April 7). I promised her I would not. I watched as the bus left the park.”
Chukwuemelie had no inkling that her sister and her entire family were heading for a violent death. Mbachu’s husband had died about 10 years before, leaving her to cater for the children.
Chinyere was going to graduate from Igbinedion University, Okada, Edo State later this year. Her mother had retired in December 2012 as a vice principal in a girls’ secondary school in Enugu.
Chukwuemelie said, “On Friday, the day of the accident, I saw some missed calls on my phone. When I called the number back, I realised it belonged to a road safety official.
“He told me the bus my sister and her family were travelling in developed a fault on the road. He said nothing more than that. We had no idea they were dead. We did not know the truth until the following day when my younger brother went to the bus terminal at Jibowu. I was shattered. Most of the information we got was from the newspapers.
“Our tragedy was more painful, because our 81-year-old mother kept asking for them when they did not arrive that day. We had told her to expect them that Friday. She kept calling, asking why they were late.”
One can only imagine the feeling of other family members, whose numbers were listed on the manifest, when their phones rang and they were informed them about the crash.
James Nwachukwu, 40, got the same call informing him that his wife, Faith, 34 had been involved an accident. He was given no further information.
Nwachukwu said he nearly ran mad when he demanded information about the accident and did not get any.
“Faith was my mother, my sister and everything I had,” the grieving man told our correspondent.
When our correspondent called him on the phone, he said he was in a bus, on his way back from the accident site.
“I went to the accident scene, and to the mortuary where they said some bodies were kept. I was hoping I would get even bones. But I got nothing. Everything was burnt to ashes. She was travelling to attend the traditional wedding of her sister,” Nwachukwu said in a voice choked with emotion.
The grieving husband said when his wife took the bus, they hugged and Faith said, “Honey, goodbye.” He replied, “Go in peace dear.”
His wife, who had yet to have a child since they got married in 2010, was listed as number three on the manifest.
For Chief Ikechukwu Ozor, a couple who died in the crash, Bona and Chidinma Okwor, were so close to him that they both put his phone number as their contact.
He stated that Bona, 47, and Faith, 39, embarked on the journey to attend the wedding of a member of Seaboard Promotions Club, of which they were also members.
Ozor told Saturday PUNCH, “They had been married for more than 10 years and had two boys and a girl. Luckily, they did not travel with their children.
“I have never seen a more godly and loving couple. They stayed in my house for three years when they first came to Lagos. That was how close we were. The call I got that they were involved in an accident and subsequent reports that all occupants burnt to death was too much for me to bear. It was simply heart-rending.”
He said the couple’s children had been moved to the home of their cousin in Lagos.
However, not all the relations of the victims could summon the courage to speak on the tragedy that had befallen them.
Numbers 21,22,23 on the manifest belonged to the same family, Odiginma. They also have the same phone number in the space provided for next of kin.
The man who picked the call when our correspondent dialled the number was obviously still very shaken.
He managed to say that the victims were his mother and his two nephews.
He was not in a condition to speak on the incident, he told Saturday PUNCH.
The Johnson family lost two people in the accident. When our correspondent visited them at their Lawrence Daniel, Ajao Estate, Lagos residence, he met a woman in shock. Her husband, Joachim Johnson, died in the accident.
The woman, Rita, was devastated because she was not aware of the death of her husband who travelled with his apprentice, until two days after the accident.
She was so traumatised that she was rambling, unable to recall whether Joachim was his husband’s surname or first name.
Joachim occupied seat number 37 in the bus, while the boy he was travelling with, Richard Onyeneke, was on seat number 34.
Rita said, “He had a contract to install some air conditioning units at Abagana (in Anambra State). We were communicating on the phone periodically during the journey.
“But after a while, I tried his line but it did not go through and I thought he must have got to a place where there was no network. I kept on trying though.
“The following day (Saturday), when I did not hear from him, I phoned the people whom he was supposed to go and work with and they also said they had not seen him. I was devastated and so worried. I had no information and it did not even occur to me to me to watch the television or read the newspapers.
“I did not know there had been an accident until Sunday when a stranger called me,” she recalled.
Rita said the caller simply said, “Sorry for your loss madam.” When she yelled at the caller, querying him for making such a “stupid joke,” she was told to switch on her television and buy a newspaper. The call then disconnected.
Rita scrambled to switch on her television. When she did not get the information she wanted, she sent for a newspaper and there, she read about the death of her husband in the accident.
As our correspondent searched through the family album to get a photo of Joachim, his three-year-old son helped point out his daddy’s photos, oblivious that his father was not coming home.
The boy did not seem to understand the reason there were so many people in their home and why his mother occasionally cried, “Eh, Joe is gone!”
With tears running down her face, Rita lamented that the bodies that had been recovered were beyond recognition.
“We went to the mortuary at Benin. Oh, Jesus! I could not recognise any of those burnt bodies as that of my husband. We came home empty-handed,” she said.
These are stories of some of the people who lost their loved ones in last Friday’s tragedy. Many other families out there are still trying to come to terms with the reality that their loved ones who bid them goodbye that fateful morning did that for the last time.
Worse is the fact that their bodies cannot be claimed by their family members for burial as they were burnt beyond recognition and were therefore given a mass burial on Tuesday in Benin.
Source – Saturday Punch