36 Igbo Traders Died In Jos Bombing -Eze Igbo community in Jos has said it lost 36 members and 42 others injured in the May 20 bomb blasts that rocked Jos Terminus Market. In addition, the community said many others were still unaccounted for while Igbo traders lost goods worth unspecified amount of money. Eze Igbo, Prof. Jerome Obilom, who addressed newsmen in Jos on Monday, said the community vehemently abhorred the mass burial secretly conducted by the state government without informing members of the community. He argued that Ndigbo were not in the habit of burying their dead outside their homestead. He said some hospital authorities were very hostile when the community led by the Chairman of the Igbo Community Association, Chief Jonah Ezekwueme, visited them to identify victims of the blast who were of Igbo extraction. Obilom said there was the need to compensate victims of the bomb blast, adding that in the past incidents, Ndigbo were neglected and made to bear the cost of burying and rehabilitating their members alone. He said, “While recognising the fact that some of the victims were shattered into shreds, which necessitated that some body parts were packed into bags that necessitated the mass burial, we still insist that Ndigbo in Jos should have been consulted to identify their own because it is not our custom to bury our dead outside our traditional homes. “We therefore condemn such act and implore the authorities to allow Ndigbo access to the bodies so that those missing could be accounted for because if we had been allowed inside the mortuary, we would have been able to identify many of our members who were unfortunately caught up in the bomb blast.” He said the community was able to identify the dead through town and community who a carried out a headcount of their members. The Ezeigbo deplored a situation where Ndigbo were neglected in the distribution of relief materials and urged the authorities to send such materials to aid the victims and their families. He also asked the Plateau state government to hasten efforts in the relocation of streets traders to the Satellite market in Rukuba road area of Jos, adding that the cognition caused by the traders along the busy road was responsible for the heavy losses caused by the bomb blast. Obilom said the Igbo community was in support of any efforts being contemplated by the state government to bring sanity to the markets in the state. Punch.
Posted on: Mon, 26 May 2014 15:20:24 +0000
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