December 10, 2010, it was exactly five years since some of the brightest students of the prestigious Loyola Jesuit College , Gidan Mangoro, Abuja lost their lives (along other unfortunate passengers)in a Sosoliso flight that crashed right inside the Port-Harcourt Airport. Expectedly, it is very difficult to erase the memory of that unfortunate incident from the hearts of their parents, relations and friends. To them, five years remain like yesterday.... some colleagues of the students-victims spoke to WOLE SHADARE on occasion of the anniversary. Excerpts...
Damilola Ade-Odiachi said he just could not believe the news that hit him. He thought it was a joke made in extremely poor taste or a movie with someone else as the star, and not his friends, who were unfortunate to be victims.
“When the reality of the situation finally hit me I didn’t cry. I felt blank. I wondered how a person who had lost 10 per cent of his community should feel. It didn’t matter that I didn’t know everyone on the flight, and it didn’t matter that I hadn’t been close to everyone on the flight. At the end of the day I had lost a few good friends and an infinite number of opportunities”.
“I wondered what the people I had never spoken to were like and I felt bad for not being more social. For not taking advantage of the opportunities I had had to get to know them. Then I was angry. I was angry at Sosoliso for crashing, I was angry at Nigeria and I was angry at myself. I felt guilty for being angry because there had been other plane crashes”.
“There were other people who had lost friends and family. When those other crashes happened I put the departed in my prayers but I remained oblivious to the pain that those left behind experienced. I finally understood how those affected by the failures of our government felt and I hated that I had been too selfish and naive to care”.
The closest victim to Damilola was Wole Ajilore, whom he said he met when he was 11 years — probably the first friend he made in Loyola. Damilola described Wole as blunt and intelligent.
For Iyinoluwa Aboyeji, he rather went philosophical and poetic on the issue, noting that “If there were a single word with which I could sum up my years in my home country, Nigeria , it would be tragedy. Yes. I know what you may have been expecting to hear that despite our poverty and strife we are a happy people; that the diversity of culture makes up for the disappointment of socio-political stability, and conflict that we have the best music and the most exuberant population in all of Africa; that you can and should visit my country. I do not deny that all these things may be true. However, I choose not to give to you that pitch — at least not today”.
“The frustration with being Nigerian is that you have no answer to the most profound question of identity — who am I? Am I a part of an imperialist creation destined never to advance or a nation still in the difficult terrain of nation building? Am I part of a nation of talented internet fraudsters or a nation of resourceful people apt to put their talent to whatever use? Or am I a part of a fractured nation of people or of the most beautiful mosaic of diversity? The many acolyte questions that stream from this mother vine question of my Nigerian experience are endless”.
He admitted that the tragedy changed him. That December 10, 2005, Iyinoluwa lost all 60 of his schoolmates — including his very best friend —to a plane crash as they travelled home for the holidays.
He described it as that day he lapsed into that most beautiful state of confusion. In this state, he had come to resent his government, readily blaming the political leaders for the many problems of a half-hearted rescue operation that could only boast two survivors.
Iyinoluwa stated that he had good reason to believe that the government was the problem. He recalled that the plane was attempting a manual landing as the control tower was without electricity for two weeks — “the plane was 34 years old instead of the four years that had been plugged into government records; the fire and rescue services that came to salvage the situation had come with empty tanks, and a substantial number of the potential survivors had died in the arms of their loved ones as they waited endlessly for medical attention that was ‘unavailable.’ So I sneered at the system, unforgiving of the many that had massacred my talented friends”.
According to Iyinoluwa, he had solemnly embarked on the return journey to the shared misery of a mourning school when the holidays were over. “As our car approached the school, I soon discovered that our tragedy had galvanized a widespread interest: the single paved road that led to the school was congested by press vans and other tourists seeking to explore this tragedy. In the traffic that ensued, it soon became clear that I would have to walk for at least a kilometre through a village path to reach the school gates.
“As I solemnly marched through the stretch of Gidan Mangoro village on this hot Friday afternoon, I saw, for the first time, the evident disparity between the opulence that had characterized our elite learning environment and the poverty that characterized our host community. As I walked through clusters of straw huts with rusted and leaky iron roofing, watching children of school age hawk roasted plantains, or chase tires on the street naked, the scales of ignorance and self-conceit fell off my eyes”.
“I realized that despite my justifiable distraught over the death of my friends, this occasional sacrifice was nothing compared to the daily struggles of this everyday people. It seemed to me that every day was another plane crash for the good people of the village and worse; they did not even have the luxury of mourning. The inferred revelation was simple as truth always is: I was experiencing a tragedy; they were living one”
Iyinoluwa admitted that before the events of that cold and sad December, he had lived a rather protected childhood, immune from the realities of poverty and evil that circumscribed him.
He recalled, however, that when tragedy found its way to him, his life suddenly opened up in front of him, still wondering how people could be so joyful in the midst of such sadness.
“I wonder how, like a repetitively jilted lover, my people could stand a life with ‘ifs’ that result in the kind of disappointment that is the tragedy of the ruled time and again. I may never know; walking on hot coals and smiling may be what it means to be Nigerian”, he added.
Deji Dabiri could not remember what went through his mind after he heard of the tragic incident. “I think I blacked out in confusion. I remember hearing my mum’s voice breaking as she told me the story. I’d already got home by then so she called me. I remember after a couple of minutes, I wanted to cry but I couldn’t. I didn’t process the information as most people did. I don’t even remember asking God ‘why?’ I was torn between extreme sadness, a lot of anger, confusion. But I couldn’t fully express those feelings. It didn’t fully hit me for a while, but my emotions came together in bits and pieces”.
“Every time I think about December 10, the first person to come to my mind is Chuka Ilabor. We played basketball together and he was one of the most annoying people to play against because he was such a sharp shooter. And he had a certain assurance that he was as good as he thought he was”.
“I remember Chinweoke Mba, specially because the morning of the flight, we had just made up. We were fighting for a silly reason that term, and I was awake when the students were leaving. I think we were both tired of fighting, and without saying anything she just gave me a hug. We spoke for a while, but it was time for her to get onto the bus. She wrote her number on my arm, and I promised to call her. I tried calling the number as soon as I heard there was a survivor. I clearly remember hoping it was her, and then not hoping it was her because she’d have to live without her sister, Ijeamaka who was also on the flight. Chinweoke and I always had a stop-start friendship. But I always admired her. One of the people I miss the most”.
On how the school was able to take the tragedy, Dabiri said the institution had counselors available in the school, but what was more important was that they had their friends with them.
“We also had our parents. It says a lot about the love parents have for their children if they can put their own emotions aside to offer help and support to us. It was hard on the whole school. But I think the hardest part was everyone realizing that we had to move on. Life goes on. We couldn’t just stay remorseful because life waits for no one. We had to use the memories, the pain, the tears, to inspire us to become better people”.
Sandra Nwosu told The Guardian that she could not remember being in control of her thoughts. At that moment she felt very unsafe, with a lot of pain.
“I started doubting that the world, especially our country was secure. I wasn’t sure of anything anymore. I guess I was just hoping it was a mistake — that it was some kind of prolonged dream”.
“Chinweoke Mba was simply beautiful. She was a kind person. She was very interesting to be around. She saw the fun in a lot of things. Her stories were captivating as she told them. I still find myself thinking about her or even replying her stories in my head. She was only 16. Sandra Gbemudu was my mortal (aka school daughter). She had just completed her first term at Loyola. She was barely 11, but made some very insightful comments. I was heartbroken for her mother’s sake because I knew they had lost her dad not too long before the plane crash”.
“Onyeka Okereke was our ‘Einstein’. We had just found out that our mothers were very close friends, so had become closer. ‘Odok’ as we fondly called him (his initials), was a very bright young man. It was not just academics. It was in the way he spoke and approached people. He was very mature. He had a lovely voice too. With the help of some other energetic classmates, we would usually burst into various gospel songs during ‘free’ time. He always had one of the lead roles. He was 15”.
“Zikora Okafor was a natural leader. He led the Altar Servers’ Organization which I was a part off for a while before he passed. He was a calm boy who knew what was right and got it done. He was the head boy at that time so the whole school felt his absence. He had strong charisma that everyone was attracted to. He was 16”.
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