REVEALED: Police ‘refused’ to take Ekiti doctors’ corpses to mortuary until they were paid N4,500

Ekiti state is still in mourning mood following Sunday’s death of six doctors in a road mishap a few kilometres to Kaduna on their way to Sokoto for a free medical mission organised by the Nigerian Medical Association (NMA).

The three-day mourning declared by Ayodele Fayose, governor of the state, is yet to expire; but even when it does, revelations that will prolong the grief of friends and families of the victims are beginning to emerge.

On Tuesday, the Kaduna state sector command of the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), attributed the accident to over-speeding.

Salisu Galadunci, sector head of operations, deputy corps commander, told NAN in Kaduna: “Twelve medical doctors and a driver were in an 18-seater bus travelling to Sokoto for Nigeria Medical Association (NMA)’s annual conference and had a tyre burst due to over-speeding.

“The vehicle overturned with the occupants and six of the doctors died along with the driver while six others survived with various degrees of injuries. Bodies of the victim were evacuated to St. Gerard Hospital for depositing and medical attention.”

However, after hearing that comment, one of the six survivors of the accident, on Wednesday denied that the driver over-sped, saying that no FRSC official could have given an accurate picture of the accident, as they arrived 40 minutes late.

In a message in posted in a Whatsapp group for doctors, which was seen by TheCable, Dr. Ekundare Folu, chairman of national association of government and general medical and dental practitioners in Ekiti, said policemen at the scene of the accident refused to move the corpses of the six doctors who died, demanding to be paid N4,000.

He said that the officers, in fact, did not budge when he personally offered them N3,000 and only accepted to evacuate the corpses after another doctor added N1,500.

THE FULL POST

The comment credited to the Sector Head of Operations, Deputy Corps Commander, Salisu Galadunci, of the FRSC is very unfortunate.

This is an FRSC that got to scene of the accident more than 40minutes after the accident.

This is an FRSC that were reluctant take us to the hospital claiming they don’t have fuel and didn’t budge until one of the injured promised to buy fuel for them.

The Deputy Corps Commander was not at the scene of the accident.

Neither himself nor any representative of his spoke to any of the people in the vehicle, 6 of whom myself included survived.

The Deputy Corps Commander did not even see the vehicle either at the scene of the accident or at the police station.

How he jumped to that conclusion is beyond me. The comments is an insult to my dead colleagues and a slap on those of us that survived.

For his information this is not a driver we picked off the road to take us for the journey. This is a man that has been working with us for more than 4 years. He is indirectly telling the world that a bus of 12 doctors including several senior consultants could not control a driver we employed and pay salaries to.

I was in the same vehicle sitting in the row behind the driver and I checked the speedometer from time to time. The bus also makes a beeping sound once the speed exceeds 110km/hr. Let me state categorically that the bus driver was not speeding.

The FRSC are probably only trying to justify their intention to sell their speed limiting device to Nigerians hence associating every possible accident to excessive speeding. And it is sad that they would even attempt to use such a sad event to do such.

Even the police would not convey the bodies to the mortuary in their van until we parted with 4000naira. I personally dropped 3000naira but the police officer rejected it, dropping the money on their vehicle until the NMA chairman Dr Akinbote added 1500naira.

The second police vehicle that conveyed those of us unhurt and our luggage to join the others to the hospital also had to be topped with 3500naira black market fuel paid for by me.

Gov Ayodele Fayose. God bless you for your care and support.

Special thanks to the senator representing doka LG in kaduna for deeming it fit to visit us in the hospital.

The NMA kaduna was also wonderful. Thank you so much. Cmd neuropsychiatric hospital God bless you. All others who helped, assisted or visited us in kaduna thank you.

Dr. Ekundare Folu

Naggmdp Chairman Ekiti State