‘Within a twinkle of an eye, the boy who was wearing no crash helmet fell down, his head hitting the tarred road. The trailer dragged him along a little before it finally stopped.
By the time sympathizers succeeded in pulling him out from underneath the trailer, blood was gushing out of his head, nose and mouth profusely. Before they could reach a nearby private clinic, which was just a minute trek from the scene of the horrendous incident, the boy had passed on’
It was a tragic end. Grief pervaded the atmosphere.
Tears flowed from many eyes, cascading down the cheeks of sympathizers. Last Friday was a day of sorrow in Ado-Ekiti, the Ekiti State capital, and Ikere-Ekiti, headquarters of Ikere Local Government area of the state. It was the day a teenager, Blessing Fagbemi, a native of Ado-Ekiti, met his untimely end in Ikere-Ekiti. The boy was crushed by a truck.
The deceased’s dad, Mr. Fagbemi, was inconsolable. “Aaaah, my Blessing is gone. Where do I start from,” Mr. Fagbemi wailed. Tears rolled down from his eyes, as he cried like a baby inside the office of the District Police Officer (DPO) where he had gone to request the release of his son’s corpse.
It was the most sorrowful day of his life. It was as the whole world had come to an end for the middle-aged man who still spoke with the deceased on mobile phone less than two hours earlier, not knowing that that would be his last conversation with his son.
Blessing had just concluded his papers at the on-going West Africa School Certificate Examination (WASCE) in Osun State and had come home to attend the 19th Annual Conference of All Nigeria Conference of Evangelical Drama Ministers (ANCEDRAM), at Ekiti State Government College, Ikere –Ekiti.
But his father told him to still concentrate on his studies, insisting that the boy would have more opportunities to participate in such conference in future if he could exercise patience.
The reporter learnt that contrary to his father’s instruction, Blessing sneaked out of home, took his brother’s old motorbike and rode it to Ikere, about 10 minutes’ drive from Ado-Ekiti without his father’s knowledge. Besides the fact that the bike, with registration number Ekiti QC 409 EFY, was considerably old, Blessing apparently was just learning how to ride a motorcycle.
An eyewitness, a female member of ANCEDRAM who claimed to have also come from Ado-Ekiti, told our reporter that after getting to the Ekiti State Government College, Ikere-Ekiti, venue of the conference, Blessing was yet to conclude the necessary registration when he allegedly said he was going out again to the town. “When he was going out, a fellow Christian brother who saw him asked him to offer one of our executive members, Tokunbo, a free ride to the town.
The latter was taking two creates containing empty bottles soft drinks to the town to buy drinks for participants at the conference,” the lady stated.
At the Ikere Roundabout, located in the heart of the town, Blessing was said to have turned right, facing the Ikere/Ado-Ekiti Road. Soon after, an old woman was said to have suddenly appeared and was crossing the road. In an effort to avoid knocking her down, Blessing reportedly swerved and in the process lost control of the bike.
Realizing that the bike was about to run into a trailer moving on the same lane with them, Tokunbo who sat at the back with the two creates on his lap, quickly jumped off and fell beside the road. Unfortunately, Blessing and his motorcycle rammed into the trailer and fell by the middle tyres. Within a twinkle of an eye, the boy who was wearing no crash helmet fell down, his head hitting the tarred road. The trailer dragged him along a little before it finally stopped.
By the time sympathizers succeeded in pulling him out from underneath the trailer, blood was gushing out of his head, nose and mouth profusely.
Before they could reach a nearby private clinic, which was just a minute trek from the scene of the horrendous incident, the boy had passed on.
Tokunbo, who was later discovered to be the immediate past Public Relations Officer of the Ekiti State Chapter of ANCEDRAM, merely sustained injuries in his right leg and hand and was quickly taken to that clinic for medical treatment.
However, confusion came when the commercial motorcycle riders in Ikere-Ekiti besieged the scene of the accident and nobody among them could identify Blessing, all saying he was not their member.
But when traffic police officers came, they used his phone to call some names until they were able to reach his father.
The Divisional Traffic Police Officer, (DTO) for Ikere-Ekiti, Joseph, a Superintendent of Police, led his men there to control both vehicular and human traffic as people continued to storm the scene. He also ensured the corpse was quickly taken to the mortuary.
He ordered the arrest of the driver of the trailer, Mr. Olusegun Olatunji and said the truck, with registration number Lagos XR 639 AKD, be towed immediately.
