Survivors of the Wednesday twin bomb blasts at the popular GSM Market in
Kano have recounted their ordeal. The suicide bombers killed about 18
people and injured 99, while property and goods worth millions of naira
were destroyed.Eyewitness accounts stated that a Volkswagen Space Sharon vehicle
dropped off the Hijab-wearing teenage girls and zoomed off. While one of
them made straight for the heart of the ever busy market, the other
headed for the roadside of the market. In the twinkling of an eye, the
bombs went off; people died, some were injured and a heavy stampede
ensued.
A survivor of the twin blast, Ibrahim Isa, told the Nation he was almost buried
by corpses and electrocuted when the blast occurred while attempting to
move out of the danger zone. According to the 30-year-old, the
explosions occurred at about 4:30 p.m. immediately after he finished
vending mobile phones to some operatives of the State Security Service
(SSS).
injury to his right cheek from the electric shock, narrated that the
female suicide bomber that detonated her explosive in the market stood
by him and pretended to be mobile phone customer, adding that he never
thought she was a suicide bomber until she committed the heinous act.
“The blasts occurred as soon as I returned from one shop where I
collected some mobile phones and sold to some DSS operatives, who are my
customers,” he said. “I saw the girl standing beside me but I didn’t
know she was the suicide bomber until she detonated her bomb. As soon as
the bomb went off, I saw many people on the ground. I was also
electrocuted and thought I was going to die before Good Samaritans came
and rescued us.”
Another survivor, Musa Idris, a 26-year-old final-year Department of
Economics student of the Kano State Polytechnic, who had multiple
fracture on his left leg, said:
“On that fateful day, I finished my
lectures and headed straight to the GSM market to repair my phone with
the N1,000 I collected from my dad a day before for that purpose. I was
hoping to beat time so that I can rush back to school to prepare for my
final examination but as I was negotiating with the technician, all I
could hear was a loud sound that swept me off my feet. I could not
recollect anything more until I was brought to the hospital. I was dazed
and unconscious.
“Now, my problem is no longer the pains I bear, but the psychological
trauma of missing my final examination. Very soon, my classmates will
be going for the NYSC programme, but here I am with a fractured leg. I
never believed this could happen to me. I am now in a pathetic
situation. I am from a poor family. My father had invested almost all
his life savings on me, hoping to reap back, but now that I am about
graduating, Boko Haram has put a coma on my future.”
Abdulsalam Sani, 32, and son of immediate past Commissioner for State
Affairs in Kano, Comrade Aminu Abdulsalam, was also a victim. He said:
“I drove to the GSM Market with the intention of buying a mobile
handset. Immediately I parked my car, and in my attempt to enter the
market, I heard a bomb blast. As I was making another attempt to reverse
my car, not knowing that another bomb was close to where my car was, I
heard another blast. And I got injured on my two legs and my right arm.
That was how I was brought to AKTH.”
Najib Ali, 25, who is on admission
at the Murtala Muhammed Specialist Hospital with severe head injury,
said he was in the market to buy battery for his cellular phone when the
incident occurred. He prayed for God to have mercy on the souls of the
dead and added that he had accepted what happened to him as predestined
by God.