A passenger in a commercial bus, who witnessed the accident, told Punch in Osogbo on Sunday that Mr. and Mrs. Olumide Bankole; their children, Sharon and Shama, were crushed to death by the truck which lost control in an attempt to avoid running into a queue of vehicles on the road due to a police checkpoint.
The eyewitness, who identified himself as Leke Okunola, said rescuers at the scene learnt that the family was traveling from Ogbomoso in Oyo State to Ibadan when the accident occurred around Odo Oba River on Christmas Eve.
He said the car in which the Bankoles were travelling was coming from Iwo and heading towards Ibadan, while the truck was coming from Ibadan.
The eyewitness blamed the accident on the police checkpoint, saying if the road block was not there, the accident would have been avoided.
Okunola said, “The car in which the victims were travelling was coming from the opposite direction and after the police had checked him, he moved, but a trailer which was loaded with bags of rice lost control and fell on the car.
“The truck was on top speed. The driver saw a long queue of vehicles caused by the police checkpoint. The driver did not want to ram into the vehicles on the queue and veered off the lane. That was when the car was cleared to go.
“The driver of the car saw the truck and drove into the bush. The truck driver, however, lost control and fell on the car.
“The driver of the car, his wife and two children, including a baby, were all dead by the time they were rescued from under the truck.”
The Chairman of the Non Academic Staff Union at the Osun State
University, Mr. Isaiah Fayemi, who is an in-law to the Bankoles, said
the family had been thrown into deep mourning since the accident
happened.
He called on the Inspector General of Police, Mr. Suleiman Abba, and the Commissioner of Police in Osun State, Mr. Abubakar Marafa, to investigate the cause of the accident and punish those found culpable.
He called on the Inspector General of Police, Mr. Suleiman Abba, and the Commissioner of Police in Osun State, Mr. Abubakar Marafa, to investigate the cause of the accident and punish those found culpable.
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