Survivors of the bomb blast in Dilimi Yantaya Mosque where Sheikh
Yahaya Jingir was conducting Tafsir have given a vivid account of how
the blast occurred in the area.
A widow identified as Mama Peter has disclosed that she lost two of her children in the Bauchi road motor park blast.
Mama Peter who was a food vendor at the park when the explosion occurred
said her two children were helping out to serve food to customers
before the explosions consumed the two of them. She wept disconsolately
as she told her story.
Another resident, Malam Ademu, a dealer of textile materials who escaped
narrowly, said they were inside the mosque listening to a sermon when
all of a sudden they heard sporadic gunfire coming from all directions
which were accompanied by laud explosions.
He said immediately the explosions occurred, the light went out and the
whole place was plunged into total darkness with panic-stricken people
falling over themselves. He added that dead bodies littered the ground
as people ran helter-skelter, with those who sustained serious injuries
crawling around on the ground, crying for help.
At the Plateau Specialist Hospital, Jos, It was observed that corpses
littered the ground as relatives of victims tried to identify them
either by the shirts or shoes they wore, as many of them were mutilated
beyond recognition.
A medical worker on condition of anonymity
said some of the corpses were yet to be claimed because they were burned
and mutilated.
Meanwhile, the death toll from the twin bomb blasts that rocked a Mosque
at Dilimi Yantaya and a restaurant at Bauchi road motor park in Jos
North local government area of Plateau State on Sunday night has risen
to 44.
It was learnt that some of the dead had been buried, but the injured are
receiving treatment at various hospitals, namely, the Plateau State
Specialist Hospital, Our Lady of Apostle hospital, Bingham University
Teaching Hospital (Jankwano) and Sunnah Hospital, Angwan Rimi, all in
Jos, the Plateau State capital.
Among the dead the husband of former Plateau State commissioner of
tourism during Chief Joshua Dariye’s tenure, Hajiya Fati Kyari. Mr.
Kyari’s body was pierced with bullets.
The coordinator, North Central, National Emergency Management Agency
(NEMA), Mr. Mohammed Abdulsalam said 44 people lost their lives while 47
others were critically injured in the twin blasts.
Abdulsalam told journalists at the premises of the Plateau State
Hospital, Jos, that a majority of the wounded were admitted at the
intensive care unit (ICU) of the Plateau Specialist Hospital.
“This was the first hospital we brought them to but because of the
casualty figure, the hospital facility was overstretched so we took some
of them to Bingham University Teaching Hospital, Jankwano and Our Lady
of Apostle Hospital,” he said, adding that the agency had made
provisions for some consumables to be used in treating the patients.
In reaction to blast at Yantaya Mosque in Jos, youths in the area
allegedly set ablaze the Cherubim and Seraphim Church in Dilimi.
The church had suffered a series of destruction in past riots but has remained the only one still standing in this area.
Meanwhile, the Plateau State governor, Simon Lalong, has described the
attacks on his state as unfortunate and highly condemnable, even as he
called on residents of Jos North and the entire citizens of the state to
remain calm and to “stand in solidarity with one another in the face of
the onslaught by agents of death on our collective resolve to remain as
one united people in spite of ethnic and religious differences.”
According to a statement issue and signed by the director, Press and
Public Affairs, to the governor, Samuel Emmanuel Nanle, it is
regrettable that at a time when Muslim faithful are settled to the
fulfilment of a religious obligation, agents of death, chaos and anarchy
have chosen to disrupt the peace of the state by orchestrating a spade
of sporadic bomb blasts to portray a state of dissatisfaction that
pitches otherwise peaceful co-inhabitants against themselves.
Governor Lalong also urged president Mohammadu Buhari to return military checkpoints in order check future recurrence.
The governor further directed all medical institutions in the state to
respond to medical situations at government expense with respect to the
emergency situation at hand.
Also, a member representing Barkin Ladi/Riyom federal constituency at
the House of Representatives, Hon. Istifanus Gyang, yesterday strongly
condemned the twin bomb attacks at Jos metropolis on Sunday night.
