• Eyewitnesses tell gory tales just before Diko tanker explosion
From John Adams, Minna
For the people of Dikko, Gurara Local Government, Niger State, January 18, 2025, was not just a black day. It was a day of hell. The gate of hell was literary opened for a few seconds and a hailstorm of fire was let loose upon the community
The day had started well. It was another market day and traders from far and near had started flooding to the market to buy and sell. A clement sky! A lovely day! Little did the world or any of the victims know that the worst was stalking in the corner. Little did they imagine that the end had come and their world would explode.
But it happened. At about 10.00 am when the sun was still fresh, the unthinkable struck. First, it was an unusual accident, an accident involving a North-bound petrol tanker conveying about 60,000 litres of petrol. The crash consequently resulted in the spill of the petrol content on the highway and around the adjacent areas.
Then came a large number of desperate and hungry Nigerians, who rushed to the scene to scoop the highly priced petrol content to resell for quick cash. Amid the scramble of scoping buckets and jars the explosion occurred.
The damage from the tanker explosion was huge. As at Sunday night, the Niger State Emergency Management Agency (NISEMA) put the official death toll at 86 while indicating that 55 victims were in critical conditions at various hospitals. The deceased were burnt beyond recognition and buried in mass grave, as identification was almost impossible.
Besides the death of scores of men and women including young boys and girls, nearby shops, houses, cars, tricycles and other valuables, not easily estimated, were burnt to ashes.
Days after the tragedy, the popular Diko along the ever-busy Abuja-Kaduna Expressway, is still a dark spot dressed like a graveyard. It is lonely, forlorn and sad. The community surrounding the junction is also in deep gloom. Many families are still counting their losses. Many more are still inconsolable. The tragic incident has left a sense of bereavement that is very hard to erase.
Witness accounts
Sunday Gogna, a businessman, told Daily Sun: “I couldn’t believe what I saw that day, it was terrible.” He said five additional people died on Monday morning, bringing the death toll to 98 while 69 were receiving treatment in different hospitals. He said that the number of fatalities could still rise due to the degree of burnt suffered by some of the victims.
According to him, 90 per cent of the victims were those who had abandoned their legitimate businesses to scoop fuel from the accident tanker: “There were some ill-fortuned traders coming to Diko Saturday Market but were accidentally caught by the explosion.
“I lost three of my relatives who were on their way to the market in a commercial vehicle. Their vehicle was at the exact spot where the tanker exploded and all the occupants of the vehicle were roasted to death.
“It was not all the victims that went to scoop fuel from the tanker. Many other victims were going about their normal businesses when they ran into the hand of death that came through the explosion.
“Some were just at the vicinity by accident and didn’t have the wisdom or knowledge to have escaped from such a location.
“Nobody can really say or place what happened and how it happened. They were using all kinds of containers to scoop the fuel, including iron buckets. Since they were doing it indiscriminately and with reckless abandon, you should expect what happened to have happened. This is my nearest guess as to what led to the explosion.”
“He attributed the high casualties to the fact that it was the community’s market day. A factor, he stated, had led to over-crowding at the affected area with people and activities as at the time of the accident.
Another member of the community, Kelvin Ezekiel Dogo, lost his 30-year-old brother to the explosion. His brother had left his legitimate business of motorcycle spare parts to join the scoopers: “He was among those burnt beyond recognition and given a mass burial.
“I cannot really say whether he actually joined them in scooping the fuel or the fire met him in his shop because I was in the market. But those who saw him said he was also scooping the fuel. His shop was also burnt down along with other shops in the area.”
He disclosed that over 30 shops were razed down with goods worth millions of naira destroyed in the inferno that followed the explosion.
Abdullahi Mohammed is another businessman: “I lost three of my younger brothers who were helping me to manage my businesses. I lost three shops, including a Point of Service (POS) shop with N3million cash. My brothers were not among those scooping the fuel, but they fell victims because their shops were very close to the tragic scene.
“It is not everybody who died that was involved in the scooping of the fuel. Many innocent people were just sitting in their shops when they were consumed by the fire. It was an unfortunate situation that we are finding it difficult to come term with. We are all devastated and I am still in shock.”
Past tanker explosions in Diko
History repeats itself but man hardly learns from the past. There have been previous cases of tanker explosions in and about the Diko Junction. Although the cases recorded losses, the magnitude was not as much as the present case.
Mohammed said: “For instance, in March 2019, at about 10; 00pm just as the community was rounding up their businesses, they were hurriedly sent packing when a fuel tanker, said to have been loaded with 60,000 litres capsized and exploded.
“When the inferno settled down the following day, no fewer than 20 people were burnt to death while sleeping in the shops. About 35 shops were razed down and 19 vehicles, mostly commercial, belonging to drivers who had retired home after the day’s work, were consumed.
“Two months later, precisely in May of the same year, while the community was trying to pick up the bits and pieces of their lives, another fuel tanker exploded. However, this time around, only one person was killed while about 20 others were injured and unspecified numbers of shops were equally razed down.”
Former governor Sani Bello had threatened to ban petrol tankers from plying the state highways, with violators risking jail term or a fine of N500,000. The law, however, did not come to effect until the expiration of his tenure in 2023.