Graphic photos: Bishop Ezeokafor’s village looses 9 women ---Awka Catholic Diocese, Nanka Community, Orumba North mourn death of 9 CWO members

www.odogwublog.com reports exclusively that tears flowed freely in cheeks of indigenes of Nanka community, Orumba North local government area as Catholic Bishop of Awka Diocese, Most Reverend Paulinus Chukwuemeka Ezeokafor in company of Chairman of Orumba North local government, Chief Okey Enekwe visited the Immaculate Heart Hospital and Maternity , Umunze where 20 members of the Catholic Women Organization (CWO) involved in a ghastly accident were brought to.
Bishop Ezeokafor is from Nanka community and the victims were from Enugu-Nanka. He prayed for the living to recuperate quickly while he equally blessed the 9 dead victims at the morgue. He consoled himself and members of his community and Orumba North chairman, Chief Okey Enekwe for the lost assuring that the Church will be involved in assuaging the pains of the families of the victims and giving them a befitting burial.
He decried the mishap and literally wept for the situation of the patients even as he thanked God for sparing some of them.

Orumba North local government Chairman, Chief Okey Enekwe who aborted his programme at Governor Willie Obiano’s award giving ceremony by Orumba forum to rush to the scene and stayed till Friday evening attending to emergencies associated with accident declared two days mourning for the calamity that befell Orumba North.
Chief Enekwe recounted that over 50 persons have lost their lives due to recklessness of tipper and lorry drivers in Anambra state in the last one year, and called for a one week workshop for the tipper owners and drivers by the state government in partnership with Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) to reduce their recklessness and arbitrary and poor decisions on the road often induced by drug abuse and excessive drinking.
He appealed on Anambra state Government through the Ministry of Health to assist the local government with logistics for the care and treatment of the victims as well as with the burial of the victims since the families were devastated by the calamity.
He commended the effort of the Governor, Chief Willie Obiano so far by releasing Ambulances through Health Commissioner Dr Joe Akabuike for assistance should need be for transfer of patients and thanked the medical personnel of the Immaculate Heart Hospital and Maternity Umunze led by Medical Director, Dr Nnamdi Ugwu for their care and attention to the accident victims.
But the Parish Priest of St Gregory The Great Nanka, Rev Fr Francis Ekejindu while blaming the accident on impatience, carelessness, recklessness and abuse of drugs and alcohol by the driver of the tipper which blurred his judgment at that auspicious moment said the victims were coming back from a burial Nawfija in Orumba South before encountering the misfortune.
He said the mother of their cook died and the women went for a condolence and have finished only to meet the accident on their way back home before Ajalli police station and Orumba North local government Headquarters when the tipper did not wait for another tipper with sand before it to complete negotiating a bend and drove out into the 18 seater bus, knocking it off the road into the gutter.
He said the bus had 19 occupants against 20 confirmed by the victims, adding that 6 died at the spot while three more died later at the hospital. He said 10 are alive and responding to treatment while 2 have been referred to Nnamdi Azikiwe University Teaching Hospital, Nnewi.
He gave the names of the dead as Mrs Susan Okafor , mother of Sister Jane Francis Okafor , Mother General of Sisters of Jesus The Saviour Elele Rivers state; Mrs Alice Nwankwo Igbidi; Mrs Christiana Iloh; Mrs Catherine Okafor Agu; Mrs Veronica Ezibe ; Mrs Rose Ogbunankwo, Secretary of the Parish council ; Mrs Therese Okoligan; Mrs Fedrick Ezeonwu and Mr Samuel Offormata known as Ashanti, the driver of the ill fated bus.
The two women transferred to Nnewi were Mrs Uju Obiechina and Mrs Rose Ette. The tipper belonged to Ekwulobia man while the driver is from Nsukka. The driver disappeared immediately after the accident but the police are on top of the situation even as the DPO Ajalli , CSP Patrick Odoemelem and his team were still on ground as at the time of this report.
Speaking on behalf of the victims’ families , Dr Ugochukwu Okwuba, Medical Officer of Health, Aguata local government area who was lost of words , said the living and the dead were all his relatives and they were speechless since such has never happened so in their village for a small village Enugu-Nanka to lose 9 women at a stretch.  He appealed to the Church, the Anambra state government and prominent citizens of Anambra and Orumba North to come to the rescue of the victims’ families both in burial and surviving the tragedy even as he revealed that the tipper driver was drunk at the time the accident happened.
The Medical Director of the Hospital Dr Nnamdi Ugwu said they all swung into action immediately the hospital manager Rev Fr Norbert Aginam informed them about the accident and the corpses and injured arrived 20 minutes later with all his staff even those not on duty coming together in team spirit to save lives and the volunteering of blood by onlookers, their job was made easier. He said they did their best but later lost three because whose conditions were critical but assured that aside two they have referred , that others were stable.
As at press time 6:30 pm, Catholic Women Organization, (CWO) Catholic diocese of Awka and entire Nanka community, Orumba North Local government area staff and sympathizers as well as friends and well wishers were still confused and asking why such calamity should happen to such harmless women who went to sympathize with the Reverend Father’s cook whose mother died.
 A meeting has been scheduled on Sunday by 4 pm for the families with the Bishop of Catholic diocese , Most Reverend Ezeokafor and local government chairman , Chief Enekwe and state Government for the way forward.
Story by Odogwu Emeka Odogwu