I have lost a father, brother, dear friend – Widow of murdered conductor

This is certainly not the best of times for Mrs Ini Abasirim, the pregnant widow of the bus conductor who was allegedly killed by policemen attached to the Lagos State Traffic Management Authority, last Monday, along Oshodi-Apapa expressway , owing to the devastating effect of the tragedy on her.

The widow who looked a shadow of herself is yet to come to terms with the reality of the demise of her husband of fourteen years. The 30-year-old pregnant woman with four children aged 14, 11, 7 and 4 respectively woke up as usual penultimate Monday, without any inkling that tragedy lurked around.

The first unpalatable signal reared up after her husband, Ikechukwu, 36, woke up at about 6am, a time considered late for bus conductors. He reportedly jumped up from the bed to have a quick bath. Thereafter, he donned his shirt and dashed out of the room, bidding his wife whom he fondly called mummy, goodbye. Later that day, he reportedly rushed back and instructed his wife not to allow the children go out of her sight when they returned from school and bid her farewell again, not knowing that it was his final farewell.

Everything was going on well with the pregnant woman until about 2pm when an uproar was heard outside. Crestfallen neighbours and friends who heard news of her husband’s death were wailing outside their house. She came out dumbfounded and could not fathom what was amiss until she saw her husband in a pool of his blood, stone dead, inside a commercial bus.

The distraught widow who spoke with Crime Guard on the good moments she shared with her husband whom she described as her ‘confidant, wished that she would wake up to discover that it was all a dream after all.

“ Ah!, she exclaimed. “ I know I am dreaming and will definitely wake up to find out that my husband is by my side. Where do I start from?,” she asked and paused for a while.

Tried as she could to get hold of her emotions, she could not as tears freely ran down her cheeks. After sometime, she continued: “ I was preparing for a church programme that day. In fact, I was just bringing out the cloth I would wear that evening when one of my children ran in shouting ‘Mummy, Mummy! Daddy!’ .

I asked what about daddy and he dragged my hand outside. On reaching outside, I saw a mammoth crowd gathered round a commercial bus. In my confused state, I rushed to where the bus was and to my shock, I found my husband who doubled as my friend, father, brother and confidant , lying in the pool of his blood. I shook him and shouted,’Daddy, Daddy, what happened, who did this to you’? But I was greeted with dead silence.

I begged him to wake up so we could continue from where we stopped but he did not respond. When I asked what happened, I was told he was calling passengers at Second Rainbow Bus-Stop when two buses in which were officials of LASTMA that were chasing an erring bus driver ran towards him. One of the buses knocked him down while the other ran over him. They did not even care to wait to rush my husband to the hospital. They abandoned him to bleed to death.”

Other bus drivers rushed him to two private hospitals where he was rejected, as the hospitals staff demanded for police report before treatment would be carried on him. They were on their way to the Lagos University Teaching |Hospital,LUTH when he breathed his last. We were told that as he was being rushed to the hospital, he kept saying that LASTMA officials were responsible for his state”

Describing her late husband as a man who had tall dreams for his children in spite of his job, the widow said: “ My husband never joked with the education of his children. He had plans to train them to university level, even if it meant carrying loads or pushing trucks. In fact, he had started saving towards our first child’s university education so that the burden would not be much on him.

Now, he will never live to see his dreams come true, no thanks to LASTMA officials who snuffed life out of him. My late husband was not rich but he was a very good husband and father. He never raised his hand towards me since I married him. I would miss him forever, as no one can take his place.

His death has left a vacuum in me. I just wish I would wake up and discover this is all a dream. The greatest challenge now is how to cater for our four children and the unborn one. The only person that was helping out lies stone dead in the morgue. Where do I start picking the pieces of my life,?” She lamented.

By Evelyn Usman of Vanguard