Posted by By Nwabueze Okonkwo, Onitsha on
Traders in the commercial city of Onitsha, Anambra State were on Tuesday thrown into mourning as the corpses of 26 of their members who perished in an auto crash in Gboko, Benue State arrived the town, They have been deposited at the St Charles Borromeo Hospital, Onitsha.
Traders in the commercial city of Onitsha, Anambra State were on Tuesday thrown into mourning as the corpses of 26 of their members who perished in an auto crash in Gboko, Benue State arrived the town, They have been deposited at the St Charles Borromeo Hospital, Onitsha.
Sympathizers, families, colleagues, relations and friends wept profusely and uncontrollably as their bodies were being brought out like log of woods and deposited at the hospital mortuary.
Among the deceased traders, who left for Gboko last Wednesday in a 911-lorry, to buy foodstuffs were Mr. Jude Oham (the general secretary of Ose Okwodu Traders Union) from Ezi-achi in Imo state and three women.
Chief Okwudili Ezenwankwo, president of the market union, who was in pensive mood, told newsmen Tuesday afternoon that the traders met their untimely death last Thursday, along Gboko road when the lorry conveying them and their goods had a head on collision with a trailer at about 3 a.m.
Ezenwankwo also noted that 23 of them, including the two drivers died instantly.
Ezenwankwo further stated that only three of the traders survived the accident and were receiving treatment at an undisclosed hospitals.
Sixteen of the deceased were identified as Onitsha traders while ten others came from outside the commercial city.
According to him, the traders had already declared a week of mourning in honour of the departed members, adding that the market leaders had equally planned a meeting to work out modalities for a befitting burial of their colleagues, especially the general secretary who he said died in active service.
The president said that the relations of the deceased had been coming for the arrangements and taking away the corpses, but that concrete plans were yet to be worked out, stressing that the market leaders were at the final stage of the burial plans which he said would soon be made public.
Meanwhile, the president of the Anambra State Market Amalgamated Traders Association (ASMATA), Mr. Sylvester Odife (Jnr) has described the death as 'a sad news of the year,'' stressing that it was unfortunate and painful for such news to emerge early in the year.
Odife however prayed God to give the bereaved families and colleagues of the dead the fortitude to bear the irreparable loss, He urged the Federal Government to beef up security on the highways across the country to tame the upsurge of robbery incidents.
According to him it was insecurity in the country's highways that compelled the traders to take to travelling by 911 lorries to beat the menace of armed robbers on the highways