KANO BOMB ATTACK: I Have Lost My Nose, I May Die Any Moment – Survivor
It was a tale of pains and anguish as survivors of the Monday bomb attack on luxury buses in Kano recounted their experiences.
Narrating his experience, Yisau Ibrahim, a bus conductor at the motor park, who was wreathing in pains on his hospital bed, said, “I have lost my nose, I also have a deep gorge in my stomach. I am now placed on drips. I am in severe pains. I may die any moment from now, only God will avenge what these people have done to me, I will never forgive them.”
Not done, Ibrahim rained curses on the attackers, saying, “the people responsible for my ordeal would never know peace. I did not commit any offence. If I had offended them, I would have apologised to them.”
Hamisu Usman, another survivor currently on admission at the Murtala Muhammed Specialist Hospital, who was a Port-Harcourt bound passenger, lamented that the attack had distorted his plans.
The father of six wondered, “what is my offence that made these people to cause irreparable damage to my life? Allah would never forgive them if I die in the process. The fate of my children now hangs in the balance,
since what I did not expect has befallen me. I am just struggling to make ends meet, but look at the situation I am passing through now.”
For Ahmed Abubakar Warawa, 58, a cap seller, it was his desire to see his sick wife healed that led him to the motor park where he barely escaped with his life.
According to Warawa, currently on admission at the Murtala Mohammed Specialist Hospital, he was at home on Monday when he was informed that his third wife was seriously sick and he needed to get some drugs for her.
He added that since he had no money on him, he promptly rushed to the motor park with the intention to sell some caps to raise funds for the drugs.
“As I struggled to get people who would buy caps from me, I heard the blast of the bomb. When I opened my eyes, I found myself on a hospital bed.”
Recounting his experience, Yunusa Rabe, who sold onions at the park, said, “As was my practise, I was trying to persuade customers to buy onions from me. When I got to the front of Gobison Luxury bus, I saw a Volkswagen Golf car approaching us from the front. Then the bomb went off and I was hit. My worry is not the injury I have sustained, but what my family is going through. My five children and two wives depend on whatever sales I make everyday. Now where would they get something to eat?”
When Kikelomo Bolaji, a trader, left Lagos for Kano to buy some wares, she never thought of being a victim of suicide bombers.
Bolaji, currently receiving treatment at a private hospital in Sabongari, said, “I came from Lagos to purchase clothes at Kwanti–Kwari, but look at what I am passing through now. I had finished my purchase and had already spoken with my sister in Lagos to inform her that I was already at the park on my way to Lagos. It was shortly after that the suicide bombers attacked the bus that was supposed to take me back to Lagos.”
Mr Chukwu Emeka, a clothes seller, who also barely managed to survive the attack, said “I come from Enugu every month to buy Guinea brocade at Kwanti-Kwari market and resell at Enugu. I was eating at a restaurant when I was told that it was time for our bus to leave. I had to abandon my food so that I would not miss the bus. As I entered the luxury bus, I heard a loud noise. I must have passed out after that because when I woke up, I found myself on this hospital bed. I appeal to the Federal Government to find a lasting solution to these attacks.”
Emeka added that if granting the suicide bombers amnesty would be the solution, the government should do it to save the innocent people from needless attacks.
Esther Nwoke, now receiving treatment at another hospital, said, “Why is it that the Igbo people were the victims of this sad incident? I don’t even know how I arrived at this hospital, but somebody told me I was brought to the hospital in a wheel barrow because there was no car to convey the victims to the hospital as of the time the incident occurred.”
