How 7-year-old was crushed by collapsed school fence

Posted by admin Headlines Saturday, July 16th, 2011

The tragic death of a primary 1 pupil of Talimul Islam Ahmadiyya Nursery and Primary School, Adekunle, Yaba, Lagos, Master Musliu Hassan last Sunday attracted the attention of Nigerians.

It, indeed, was a serious havoc. The 7-year- old boy was crushed when the school fence wall collapsed and crushed him during the historic Lagos heavy downpour this week. Yes, the major rainy day was Sunday and Musliu was not supposed to be in school. But he was caught in a bad fate of living at a compound next to the school.

The fence that crushed him demarcates his premises from the school.
The boy was in a hut attached to the back of the fence with his father, Mr. Musa Alaba and elder sister, Rukayat Hassan when the heavy rain that ravaged Lagos and gave most residents sleepless night was on.

A source from the school told Saturday Sun that when the fence fell, people gathered to see if there were victims, but could not find any. It was when they heard Rukayat’s shout calling for rescue for her brother that they swung to action. Under the rubble, her voice kept ringing out: “Please, save us, we are dying”.
They immediately called the police at Adekunle who came and assisted in the rescue mission.
While Rukayat was brought out alive with injuries, her father had broken legs and other serious injuries. But unfortunately, Musliu could not survive, as he died on the spot.
His death was described as painful. But the people were still thankful that the incident was not on a school day, otherwise the casualty index would have escalated because the children would have been in school at that time of the day.
The school said there was no crack or other signs of fatigue on the wall prior to the rain, therefore, the collapse was just the effect of the rain that wore off the base of the wall and tilted its balance.
“We never noticed any sign that the fence would fall, we did not even know that people lived behind the wall. It was when we came to school two days after that we saw that the fence fell and killed one of our pupils and wounded his father and elder sister, Rukayat who is a Primary 2 pupil of Herbert Macaulay Nursery and Primary School.
Our investigation revealed that the little boy had been buried, while Rukayat had already been discharged from the hospital. A source from her school said she resumed school on Wednesday. Meanwhile, their father is still receiving treatment at the Orthopedic Hospital, Igbobi.
Divisional Police Officer in charge of Adekunle, Mr. Tolani Ogunjobi, CSP, confirmed the incident and described it as unfortunate. Musliu’s family had its home hitched to the fence wall, possibly a make-shift structure, and that made it very easy for the wall to collapse on them when it got weak.
Ogunjobi wondered why the victims should use the school fence as their place of abode. He advised people to always be conscious of their lives to avoid some unwarranted incidents.
Meanwhile, sympathizers have called on the Lagos State Government to look into the affairs of the schools and ensure that illegal structures are not erected near school fences to avoid a repeat of such occurrence.

-Sunwp_posts