How container crushed RCCG pastor, young sons, to death in Lagos
Among the five victims of the tragic accident that occurred in the Ojota area of Lagos last Saturday, were a father and his two children who were returning from the Redeemed Camp.
The father, a pastor identified as Charles Ezechila, was said to have attended RCCG’s Holy Ghost Service, a programme usually held on first Friday of each month, at Lagos-Ibadan Expressway.
He, along with his two children – Peculiar, 12, and Chibuike, 14 – didn’t make it home.
A 40-ft container had ended their chance of reuniting with the rest of the family.
Five persons – Charles, his sons, were pronounced dead when the huge container fell on a bus he drove. He had stopped at the bus stop for two members of the church he gave a lift to alight when the container fell on them.
Charles’ wife, Vivian, recounts her last conversation with the father of four.
According to her, she had stayed back with her other two children as she didn’t like going to the camp, and had told Charles to be careful on his way back home because of the tension in the Ikorodu area of Lagos over the notorious Badoo cult group.
She would later get an unexpected call from her pastor early Saturday morning.
“I called my daughter that I was not comfortable with the questions our pastor asked me on the telephone. I asked her to call our church member in Ojota to know if my husband and two children were in Ojota. The fellow told us there was an accident at Ojota. We then asked who was involved. He said my husband, my two sons with some other church members — one old woman and our neighbour’s child, Daniel,” she told Punch.
Vivian, who complained of the police’s conduct since the incident, begged the state government to a enforce a stricter law for trucks playing its roads.
“The government should do something about trucks and containers. They have wasted many lives. How can a truck carry a container without clipping or chaining it? If the containers were tightly held to the truck, they won’t fall off,” she said.
Many truck drivers have been found guilty of carrying loose containers and driving recklessly on Nigerian roads, thereby endangering the lives of other road users.
