A News Editor of the Voice of Nigeria (VON), Mrs. Temitope Mustapha, escaped death by the whiskers, in the heat of the Kaduna communal/religious crisis, during her trip to Kano to attend a workshop on Girl-Child Education.
Temitope shared her gruesome experience which has continued to benumb readers, on her Facebook page.
She said that the incident occurred on October 21st, when some youths she described as miscreants, stopped a vehicle she was riding in, forced every occupant out and descended on her.
The iron and stone wielding miscreant began hitting her with the iron and stoning her as she starting for safety until she fell into a gutter and went into coma.
Her story: “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 please 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” and 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 course) beckoned on one of the youths holding a fibre of an iron, of course, he responded in Hausa language and 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 and 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 head-tie (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 sides of the car I was in. 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 and opened the right side door which was already confronted by men holding all manner of irons and stones. My turban ( head-tie) 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 and hail of stones landing on my body then I watched myself being lynched with all manners of iron rods, sticks and I was being stoned 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 and I sincerely was running within me to catch up with breathe. Death is Painful.
“I suddenly didn’t 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’s and my daughter’s faces all at the same time and somehow, 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 the by-Pass. I felt peace in my body and I found solace inside the gutters. I saw these youths gathered on the other side, with blurring eyes I 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 and making gestures appealing. That was the last I saw.
HEAVY SLEEP OVER POWERED ME
“Heavy and deep sleep came over me inside the gutters, the thing overpowered me and I watched my hand threw away, from this moment I didn’t know what happened again. I cannot tell what, where and anything about me again. I didn’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 and the father of my children’s number.
AMRULLAH Hospital
“Totally to my rescue, about six drips including flagyl and 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 and demanded that the lady brought in should be released by the hospital to be killed. This Muslim hospital saved me, hid me away from them and 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 didn’t know the voice. Only the Hospital Manager, the doctor on duty and 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 and 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 and said you could come back that we should try.
Amrullah Hospital treated me and stabilised me. Then A thousand phone calls came on the Hospital Managers’ phone, they said my family members were dead alive and colleagues had sleepless night.
That I am Alive alone for now ,I am grateful to God Almighty.