Nine people who were mostly roadside traders have died in Adamawa State after a tipper lost control and rammed into the victims.
The incident happened Wednesday morning at Viniklang, a densely populated community in Girei local government area, near the state capital, Yola.
A witness told DAILY POST that no sooner had the accident happened than angry residents swooped on the tipper and set fire to it.
“The incident happened around the Viniklang Junction along the Yola-Mubi highway just after the Jimeta bridge,” the witness said.
Our correspondent writes that the Viniklang Junction, located at the point in the Yola-Mubi highway where the Viniklang main street forms a T-junction with the highway, is usually a busy spot, especially in the morning when people leave for work and in the early evening when people return home.
“As you know, that junction is always a bedlam of chaos because of the traffic buildup and the fact that motorists usually park indiscriminately,” the witness said.
Another witness said he observed that the tipper driver, who was moving towards Yola, must have tried to minimise casualty when he noticed that his brake had failed, by turning to the left side of the road where there were fewer people at the time of the incident.
DAILY POST learnt from dependable security officials at the scene of the accident that nine people died while six others sustained injuries.
Officials of the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) at the scene would not speak and a visit to the sector office in Girei town also yielded little more than a noncommittal confirmation of the death of nine people, for which the head of the office objected to being named, as he had no authority to speak to the media on the subject.
