Where Is Akan Weeks (2)



By UbongAbasi Ise

Cont. from  Monday 11th December 2017, pg 3

One may not understand the gravity of December 10, 2016 incident until they get the grasp of the ravages the affected persons are living with for more than a year now. Since the hastily reticulated, strange contraption called roof at Reigners caved in, things are no longer the same for many. Besides heavy claims on human lives, ways and pattern of lives of many people have been altered in a very terrible way; they have endured enough; their eyes have been scalded with tears; and yet silence seems to permanently take the place of justice.
                To say the truth with all sense of fairness, a lot of people that went to the failed occasion of bishopric enthronement did not just go there because they love Akan Weeks’s face, rather they were attracted to that Golgotha of death at Uyo Village road courtesy of the presence of the state governor, Mr. Udom Emmanuel. Of course it is natural for people to flock around their leader at any function. Indeed, the governor had led a sizable cavalcade of top government functionaries to make the event a scintillating one. Public attention was swayed to the Reigners Bible Church on December 10, 2016. The venue became a platform where who-is-who in the society would congregate; where old ties with the power class would be rekindled. It was a suitable place where old friendship could be re-strengthened with the governor. If there was a chance, individuals or groups would have come out to express solidarity for the governor beyond 2019. But the flying steels and sheets ended it all.
The roof fell, lives ended, several got wounded, the calamity reign, but where is the governor’s empathy?
                Late Evang. (Mrs.) Clara Ekpo, a staunch Christian and woman political leader from Ikot Abasi, had lost her life in the Reigners mishap. According to her son, Mr. Ikakke-Abasi Ekpo, her painful death came after a week she helped women group organized a resounding reception in Ikot Abasi for the wife of the state governor, Mrs. Martha Emmanuel. Her body was interred on 25th February, 2017 with absolutely no assistance from government. The deceased family had to source for money from left, right and centre to bury their dead.
                Late Clara was a breadwinner. Her family is having hard time surviving today – where is Akan Weeks? Where is the state government?
                Mrs. Rose Tom at Nsukara Offot lost her husband to the flying steels and sheets of Reigners the same day she was put to bed. Her husband, Mr. Nkereuwem was 45 when he was struck dead by the fallen truss. It can be tough and daunting for a nursing mother to fend for a young family with enormous trauma emanating from the horrible death of her husband. Rose is strong anyway; she is struggling today with absolutely no help from government, all alone.
                Mrs. Uduak Akpan from Etinan was turned a widow overnight at the wake of the Reigners Church collapse. Her late husband, Pastor Friday Akpan, 52 at the time of death, was buried in May 2017. Mrs. Akpan told our correspondent that she had to borrow money just to bury her husband because the body was staying in the mortuary for long while no response came from the state government. Today, Mrs. Uduak Akpan is struggling all alone to get her children through university education.
                When speaking with Ms. Mercy Udo who lost her sister, Peace, in the tragedy, I could sense pent up frustration and anguish in her tone. She was furious at the grotesque aloofness of the state government over the whole Reigners affairs, and demanded that Akan Weeks should provide answers to what happened to her sister. She demanded to know what happened to the report of the investigative panel and why government refuse to act after one year the tragedy occurred.
                But what happened to the report of the investigative panel?  Why is it still in the deep freezer since July 2017 after the Commission of Inquiry chaired by Justice Umoekeyo Essang delivered the report to Governor Udom Emmanuel at the executive chambers of the Government House? The state government should know that each day that rolls by is not just swiveling to the cloud of history, but represent the elongation of the suffering of the Reigners victims. It is the mellifluous sound of justice that would calm the hearts of the weeping victims.
                The implementation of provisions of the report can’t just wait another day because when water stays long in the mouth, it becomes spittle. Although the terms of reference of the Commission of Inquiry carefully elided the issue of compensation, it would make the victims and their families know that they are not condescended to. Despicable negligence by the government of Udom Emmanuel is a bad marriage to the deepening gloom of the Reigners victims. 
                At this point, I remained thankful to the concerned Akwa Ibomites who keyed into the initiative of Mr. Tony Afia, the Chairman of Planet FM, who in the company of the counsel to the victims and the estates of the dead, Barr. Clifford Thomas, reached out to 55 Reigners victims and their families. Over N3.4 million was donated and distributed to the victims to cushion the insidious effect of the misfortune: 20 relatives of the deceased received N100,000 each; 18 persons whose injuries were in the process of healing went home with N30,000 each; 11 people with serious injuries were given N40,000 per person; and 6 persons with fatal and very serious life-threatening injuries were supported with over N75,000 each.
               

Yes! I am UbongAbasi Ise. For Comment, send SMS to 08189914609 | Email: ubongabasiise@gmail.com

Source: The Sensor Newspaper

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