A group of armed bandits intercepted a Mercedes-Benz luxury bus bound for Abakaliki, SouthEast Nigeria, carrying passengers headed for the Easter holidays, robbed the passengers then set the vehicle ablaze.
The incident occurred at Oke Ado junction in Ijebu Mushin, along the Ijebu Ode-Ore-Benin expressway. The armed bandits burnt were said to be armed with cutlasses, but curiously, not firearms, according to police.
The daredevil robbers stripped all 59 passengers of their belongings, then locked them inside the bus and set it on fire, in what would have been one of the worse gruesome scenes of Nigeria’s security impasse.
The passengers however managed to break the glass windows and escaped. No one got burnt.
The vehicle belongs to a well-respected transport company, Ifesinachi Transport Nig. Ltd. The company said the bus left from Maza Maza, Lagos, on Good Friday, heading to Abakaliki, Ebonyi State. They said they are simply horrified at the unfortunate event.
The passengers included women and children.
In a video circulating online and taken by one of the victims, he described how armed men took away their belongings and subjected them to a harrowing ordeal.
“They robbed us of everything we had; some they stripped half-naked“.
“They locked us inside the 59-seat luxury bus and set it ablaze.”
“We thank God that we later escaped; nobody died, but everything we had was collected.”
“We thank God that we didn’t lose anyone, but we lost everything we were travelling with and some sustained injuries.”
“The armed robbers attacked us at Ijebu Ode. They stripped us of our dresses and belongings and beat us mercilessly. They forced us back into the bus and set it ablaze. But we are grateful to God that nobody was burnt to death because we all managed to escape from the burning vehicle alive.
“Though some of us sustained injuries, and we all lost our belongings because the robbers took everything with them, including the clothes some of us were wearing. We have been stranded here since 2 a.m. on Saturday morning: men, women, and children who are innocently travelling to the east to celebrate Easter.”
SP, Ogun State Police PRO, Omolola Odutola, confirmed the incident occurred, but could not speculate on the motive for the attack, whether it is blatant economic criminality or tainted with ethnic hate crime.
Please Like 👍, Comment, Share & Follow us on our social media handles.
WhatsApp Channel
Telegram Channel
