- Lucky survivor narrates close shave with death
“My hope, my life are all gone.” Those were the sorrowful words that flowed from 68-year-old Ayiki Sunday who lost the breadwinner of his family in last Saturday’s tin mining tragedy in Bassa Local Government Area of Plateau State. KOLADE ADEYEMI reports on how 13 villagers were trapped in the act and buried alive in a mining pit.
His son, Akubaka Sunday, a 27-year-old final year student of Civil Engineering from University of Jos, was brought home lifeless from the mining pit that consumed them last Saturday. It was the scene where the bid for survival turned into tragedy as a group of youths went out as usual to extract tin (solid mineral) from a mining site located somewhere in the bush within their community.
Artisanal (tin) mining is still trending in Plateau State, particularly in Plateau North Senatorial District comprising Barkin Ladi, Riyom, Bassa, Jos South, Jos North and Jos East local government areas. The local mining is an exercise most of the youths in the area engage in, in their struggle to earn a living and sustain themselves financially.
The case of this promising young engineering student was therefore not different from those of other youths in the state. For them, engaging in local tin mining activities is the only assured means of having access to cash to make ends meet, especially for students whose parents are too poor to sustain their academic programmes in the university.
The strong desire for artisanal mining in local communities in Plateau State is made more inevitable by the prevailing economic situation in the country where families have to go the extra mile to secure money for foods and other basic necessities of life.
The strong desire for artisanal mining in local communities in Plateau state in inevitable and unavoidable, especially at the prevailing difficult economic situations of the country where families had to go extra miles to get money for foods and basic necessities of life
So, when the undergraduate informed his father, Ayiki Sunday, that he was proceeding to the bush on that ill-fated day, the latter had no reason to stop him. Of course, there was no premonition that anything negative would happen to his son in the bush.
He said: “I was lucky to be at home to see my son before he headed to the bush. His mother was not at home to see him, so he just left a message for the mother that his friends were already waiting for him to join them at the mining site. He assured that he would meet his mother when he returned.”
That however turned out to be the last contact Ayiki had with Akubaka before the civil engineering student made the journey of no return into the bush to mine the precious metal. The day faded into night, midnight and dawn without Akubaka returning from the mining site.
By Saturday morning, there was still no premonition that anything odd had happened to their son. In his narration, the distraught father said: “On Saturday morning, just about the same time my son came from school the previous day, I was just relaxing in my house when I saw people approaching my house with what looked like a dead body.
“While I was watching, the people carrying the body came straight into my compound and dropped the body. I shouted at them, why are you bringing dead body to my house?
“They asked me to take a closer look at the body, and when I did, I clearly identified that the lifeless body was my son’s. I was told in clear terms that the body was that of my son; that he died in the mining pit in the bush shortly after he joined them the previous day.
“The news came as a shock and it actually broke me down.
“Initially, I refused to believe the news of my son’s death. But when my wife went close to see that the body they brought to my house was our son, she fainted. It took other women in the neighborhood to revive her.
“By the time I recovered from the shock, I was left with the reality of the accident. I was left with the reality that my son is no more. I am now living with the reality that all my hope is gone, Indeed, my life is gone.”
Akubaka was, indeed, the only hope of his parents, given that the family had only two children including his younger sister. The parents laboured to sponsor him through the university as the only man in the family of two.
Narrating his ordeal further to The Nation, Ayiki said: “Sunday (Akubaka) was my last hope, and my last hope is gone.”
The first son of the family had struggled through life using mining and farming to uplift his parents his younger sister and as well fund his educational career as he dreamt of becoming an engineer.
Another victim of the mining site tragedy was a 28-year-old youth corps member, Danjuma Azis. Azis, also a native of Bassa, was doing his NYSC programme in Gombe State.
Like other Plateau youths from the mining zone, Azis had taken advantage of the solid mineral to sponsor his academic career until graduation. Having adopted mining as his occupation, he travelled all the way from Gombe to his village in Jos and eventually found himself among the 13 miners who got trapped and died in the pit.
When our correspondent visited the family house in Nyakala village yesterday, the atmosphere was tense and cold. Mr Azis Ataki, father to the deceased youth corps member, said: “Danjuma was my first son in my family. He was a hard working son who helped the family in so many ways.
“He was the bread winner of the family. He fed us, clothed us and supplied all our needs with what he earned from mining. And now that he is gone, I don’t how my family is going to survive without him.
“I can’t just think of it”
Sunday and Danjuma are not the only victims of the tragic incident. There were 13 of them altogether.
Confirming the sad development, the Executive Chairman of Bassa Local Government Council, Dr. Joshua Riti, reckoned that the incident claimed the lives of 13 youths.
He said: “I was shocked to receive the news of the collapsed mining site at Mai Agwa-gwa mining camp between Jos South, Bassa and Jos North local government areas, which claimed the lives of 13 people in the early hours of Saturday, November 9, 2024.
“These victims simply went as usual to source for tin and to earn money from it. This is the first of its kind in the entire community. It is strange and mysterious.”
In his statement, Dr Riti gave the names of the victims as Shedrack Sunday (18), lrimiya Inakoro (35y), Akubaka Sunday (27) and Adukumben Sunday (18). Others are Danjuma Azis (28) and a serving corps member in Gombe State.
Those who were rescued alive from the mining pit are Daddy (Showky) and Francis Azango (26).
In an irony of faith, however, a 38-year-old father of four, Amahang Gambo Awanye, who escaped death in the incident by a whisker, told The Nation: “We went to a mining site in a village called Mai Agwagwah on Saturday morning and I went there with my brother. We ate together and I just left to buy mineral.
“When I came back, I found that my brother had already gone inside the hole. So I went down to join them in the pit.
“But while we were digging down, we saw that water just burst from the middle of the deep pit and was pouring directly into the pit.
“The pit was dud and dark; we were only using torch light to see what we were doing.
“So when the water was gushing out, we tried to see if we could block it, but the water was so much that we could not block it.
“In a few minutes, the water was already swallowing us. It was now left for everyone to find a way to escape.
“I can’t explain how I escaped. I only found myself outside the pit. And by the time I recovered, majority of us were drowned in the water. They could not escape it.
“We had to run back to the village to mobilise people to come to rescue those already drowned. The disaster happened late into the night.
“Initially when I was screaming water, water, water, some of our colleagues thought that we were trying to deceive or fool them, so that we would make more money and take advantage of them. Then they just told us that if you people are not going to work, you should let us to come in and work.
“Before the water burst, there were about 12 of us inside. So it was only about four or six that luckily survived.
“As everybody was struggling to come out, I just felt that something touched me on my forehead and I held it. I discovered it was a rope and I held the rope.
The person that held the rope said he was shaking the rope so that I would understand that there was someone that held the rope. He was trying to put the rope down.
“Then I just forgot about the rope, trying to find my way. As the water’s pressure increased, I was trying to find my way. Then I felt that someone was holding my leg.
“I struggled to draw the person that held my leg, so that we could come out together as I too was holding another person’s leg.
“After some time, I just freed the other man that I was holding his leg, to let him go so that all of us would not just die like that.
“After a short time, the person that was holding my leg was also freeing my leg. That was how I survived.”
Tin mining in Plateau State is the only venture lucrative enough for majority of youths to engage in apart from farming. And to access the mining substance, you have to dig deep, and the deeper you go, the closer the danger.
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Tin mining has taken a lot of families out of poverty and at the same time has consumed lives of members of families. And with the obvious advantages in the solid mineral and the risk involved, it is pretty impossible to avoid mining in the state.
While the victims are being buried, the living ones are on their ways to dig the soil in search of the precious stone. The business is too juicy to ignore.
Create jobs for our youths, PIDAN begs govt
Plateau Initiative for Advancement and Development of the Natives (PIDAN) in a statement said it received with great shock the death of 13 young people in Kiche land, Bassa LGA of Plateau State.
The statement said “PIDAN is saddened that young promising people have continued to be victims of such untimely deaths in the state as a result of trying to look for means of survival through legitimate mining activities.”
The Secretary General of PIDAN, Ambassador Danjuma Auta, stated that “as a people, we want to console our brothers, and the Bache nation over this loss of lives and pray that God will comfort us all.
“We want to call on our people to exercise more restraint in trying to look for means of survival and to be cautious of such activities by ensuring that safety measures are strictly adhered to.
“I want to also call on the government to provide more job opportunities for the youth to be engaged in.”
