A disaster struck in Panda, headquarters of Panda Development Area of Nasarawa State, when a little girl and a young man died inside an abandoned well in a large family compound.
The little girl, Ruqqayatu Abdullahi Audu, 7, fell inside the well last Thursday in her grandfather’s compound called Abeh Mohammed Compound, while she was sitting by the mouth, her uncle, Yusuf Abeh Dessy, told newsmen at the weekend.
The young man, whose name could not be obtained at press time, was a stranger who only happened to be passing there, and volunteered to climb down the well to rescue the girl, the eyewitness said. The girl’s uncle said the Good Samaritan climbed down the well, and not even a sound could be heard from him, sparking deeper fears in the area.
The girl was said to be sitting by the mouth of the abandoned well, which cover had partly given way, at about 6pm, while her mother and other family members were busy at various chores.
“We didn’t see her again. We called and called. There was no sound of her. So we thought she must have fallen inside the well”, the uncle said, disclosing further that the stranger was attracted to the scene of the mystery by wailings from the girl’s mother and other women in the compound.
“He went in, and that was all. We didn’t hear from him. He didn’t come out”, he said, adding “not much is known of him.”
A second person, Mohammed Abubakar volunteered and climbed down the well, according to Dessy, but like the former, he too remained quiet, and did not come out.
The uncle said a herbalist from Uke, a neighbouring community, was invited. “Sarkin Ruwan Uke (the herbalist) came and went down the well. He came out with the third person.
He could not see the girl.”
Abubakar, was rescued by the herbalist, and he told newsmen that he saw only the stranger, dead, with a bleeding mouth.
The uncle added that another herbalist was brought from Jos, in Plateau State, and he reported that some evil spirit was at work. “He left. He could not recover the corpse of the young man. Our daughter could not be seen.”
The paramount ruler of Panda, Barrister Joel Aninge, confirmed the mystery, and expressed shock at the incident which he described as “strange because it has not happened here before.”
