17th April, 2014
Sola Adeola/Abuja
Understandably, Alpha Moro became disturbed on the whereabouts of his wife who left home less than an hour before, immediately he heard about the bomb explosion that rocked the Nyanya park on Monday morning.
Then, he began the agonising search for Sefiya, a mother of four who was also five months pregnant until he finally discovered her corpse at National Hospital on Tuesday afternoon.
“I could not find her until this morning,” Moro told P.M.NEWS while making his way out of the mortuary with obvious signs of fatigue and sadness written all over him.
He sat on the pavement in front of the mortuary, surrounded by sympathetic relatives.
Moro, an employee in the protocol department of the National Assembly, told P.M.NEWS the circumstances surrounding the death of his wife in the bomb blast that has so far claimed 72 lives, according to National Emergency Management Agency, NEMA.
“My wife left home ten minutes before the bomb blast to Area 1 Garki to get some items for my younger brother’s wedding coming up this weekend. Immediately I heard the noise, I knew I was in trouble because the bus station is not far from our house.
“I rushed down there to the scene of the bomb blast but I could not find my wife.
“I rushed down to Nyanya hospital, she was not there either.
“I went to Asokoro General Hospital, Abuja Clinics, Garki Hospital, my wife was not there. At all these hospitals they told me there was no female corpse.
“So I came to the National Hospital and searched the mortuary tray by tray until I got to the last row and the last corpse, there lies the body of my wife with a pregnancy of five months.
“Her body was intact, no injury of any kind. I think she died from shock.”
Another relative of the victims of the deadly blast at Nyanya park was a lady who simply identified herself as Ebele.
The 24-year old lady was sobbing profusely at the premises of National Hospital and it took some efforts to get her to speak on the circumstances surrounding the death of her sister, Justina in last Monday’s bomb blast.
She had just discovered the corpse of her sister on Tuesday afternoon after a fruitless search that took her to other hospitals.
Other relatives who were consoling her were heard saying , “you tried your best and your conscience has set you free because you told her the truth but she refused to listen.”
Ebele and Justina, her late sister, were living in the same apartment.
Ebele told P.M.NEWS that her late sister was in the habit of leaving home without telling anybody her destination.
She said she had reported this unbecoming attitude of the 31-year old Justina, who only came to Abuja in January this year, to their parents in the village and other relatives in Abuja.
And just like in the past, Justina, a shop attendant in a boutique at EMAB Plaza Wuse ll, Abuja, left home on Friday to an unknown destination and got caught up in the bomb blast on her way back:
“I think it was on her coming back from the unknown boyfriend’s place on her way to work in Abuja metropolis when she was caught up in the bomb blast.
“We don’t even know this so-called boyfriend. I told my sister how dangerous Abuja life is, because I have been here for some years before her but she refused to listen to me. Look at what has happened now,” she said while sobbing.