A journalist and staff of Voice Of Nigeria (VON) has recounted her horrifying experience after surviving a close shave with death during the Kaduna crises few weeks back which claimed more than 50 lives with properties worth millions destroyed.
Temitope Mustapha, was travelling through Kaduna to Kano to cover the event on Media Dialogue on Equity for the Girl Child Education before being caught in the crisis.
She took to social media to share her story. Read the lengthy piece below;
Passing through Kaduna State on Sunday 21st of October 2018, to connect to Kano State for a two day Media Dialogue on Equity for the Girl Child Education , I never thought would end up bloody for me..
About 4:35pm,Two times this gentleman who was in the same car with me woke me up and said “Madam stay awake”, I replied him, see i had written stories previous nights before I embarked on this journey. Again this man woke me up and said “madam pls stay awake”.
Then I opened my sleepy eyes very wide and clearly I saw Military officers seated on their vehicles. Suddenly, a fellow passenger like me said ” Madam we have been making calls to know the safest road” & I said you mean this road is safe for us all? They all answered Yes. Suddenly at Kaduna By- Pass, I saw a trailer blocking the road and traffic was building up and the driver of the same car I boarded ( public transport of ofcourse) beckoned on one of the youths holding a fibre of an iron, of course he responded in Hausa language & another passenger translated this to me that he wanted to find another route out of By- Pass.
Suddenly, a number of the young men sighted me in the car & my driver started pleading with them, telling them ” Da Allah ki ya kuri”, I was the only female in the car and extremely unusual of me I wore what you saw in the pictures above with an headtie ( turban)that I had on me.
RACE OF MY LIFE
The young men best described as Miscreants were more than fifteen,they started hitting the side of the car I was, Actually my head was blank, I couldn’t say one word of prayer, I didn’t panic and I was ready to run the race of my life.
Immediately my fellow passengers took to their heels from the front door and the left door side , then I summoned courage opened the right side door which was already confronted by men holding all manner of irons and stones. My turban ( headtie) fell off, And I started running towards an uncompleted building immediately I realised I could be finished in the building, With heavy stones landing on my back and long metallic objects hitting my body from people running after me, I turned and thought of crossing the Gutters on Kaduna by – Pass.
O Yes I fell down with the heaviness & marathon of stones landing on my body then I watched myself being LYNCHED with all manners of iron rods, sticks and i was being stonned at the same time.
Nobody dared stopped these youths from stoning me neither was I rescued from their hands.
I actually saw one of them videoing what they were doing to me & I sincerely was running within me to catch up with breathe. Death is Painful.
I suddenly did not feel the hitting of the irons on my body again & the stones were no longer making sounds to me. I was hearing, Jesus is Lord inside my Head clearly as if with a mega phone, I was seeing my mother’s, my Son & my daughter’s faces all at the same time & some how I kept hearing in my head that all they were doing was not up to Labour Pains.
I crawled inside the Gutters ,of course I was already almost inside the Gutters by by-Pass. I felt peace in my body & I found solace inside the Gutters. I saw these youths gathered on the other side ,I blurringly saw a crowd of men watching me , And I saw clearly one of them carrying a stone with his two hands right over me, I raised up one hand pleading to him& making gestures appealing. That was the last I saw.
HEAVY SLEEP OVER POWERED ME
Heavy & Deep Sleep came over me inside the Gutters, the thing overpowered me & I watched my hand threw away, from this moment I didn’t know what happened again, I cannot tell what, where & anything about me again. I don’t know what switched me off. I was completely switched off.
Till I woke up at AMRULLAH Hospital (also along Kaduna by-Pass ) on a stretcher, I started talking telling them I am a Journalist with Voice of Nigeria and I was only passing by Kaduna State to attend a Media Dialogue in Kano State. I attempted standing from the stretcher my body didn’t respond. I was asked for phone numbers , Heaven helped me to remember my younger sister’s number & the father of my children’s number.
AMRULLAH Hospital ...
Totally to my rescue, about six drips including flagyl & All manners were set into my system. I was revived, Head suturing were done, the young Muslim doctor was crying while suturing my head, hospital attendants were cleaning stretcher stained with my blood. Everybody was put on guard. The Miscreants traced me to the hospital & demanded that the lady brought in should be released by the hospital to be killed. This Muslim hospital saved me,hidded me away from them & I realised I was kept in a ward locked with a nurse who was given instructions not to open the ward to anyone she possibly didnt know the voice. Only the Hospital Manager, the doctor on duty & two nurses were given access to where I was.
2nd Day
I asked the only face I saw when I woke up from the “deep sleep”, I said Please who brought me. He looked at me with tears filled in his eyes & said A JTF Member brought you life-less. He said “we rejected you because you were not breathing and demanded he should not drop your body with us”
The AMRULLAH Hospital Manager said, when we refuse to take you the JTF Man dropped you on our stretcher & said you could come back that we should try.
AMRULLAH Hospital treated me & stabilised me. Then A thousand plus calls came on the Hospital Managers’ Phone, they said My Family Members were dead alive & Colleagues had sleepless night.
I do have a lot to say about Kaduna State October 2018 crises. While recuperating & been on bed rest I think when my Nurse ( My mum’s eyes ) are few times away from me) I think about being carried from the Gutters by an Unknown Possibly Muslim JTF Member, I think about AMRULLAH Hospital ( a complete Muslim hospital who God used to stabilise me after coming out of deep sleep & yet not delivering me into the hands of the Hot Headed Miscreants, I think about the safety of Nigerian road users TRAVELLERS in the midst of CRISIS across Nigeria
So many thoughts feeling my sutured head but I sure must put all these thoughts down…
That I am Alive alone for now, I am grateful to God Almighty.
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