The South African government on Saturday began the repatriation of the bodies of its citizens killed in the Synagogue Church of All Nations, Lagos building collapse.
Eighty-one South Africans were confirmed killed in a guest house owned by the church of popular televangelist, Temitope Joshua, on September 12.
The bodies were removed from Isolo General Hospital and Mainland Hospital, Yaba in Lagos State. But, according to the Lagos State Chief Forensic Pathologist, Prof. John Obafunwa, the South African and Nigerian teams were only able to identify 66 bodies.
“We’ve so far identified 40 bodies at the Yaba Mainland Hospital mortuary and another 26 bodies were identified at the Isolo General Hospital,” Obafunwa said.
The South African team, including military personnel, forensic experts and pathologists were said to have arrived in Nigeria around midnight and headed for the two general hospitals to identify and repatriate the bodies of their compatriots.
Speaking further, the Lagos pathologist stated, “We have been busy since yesterday (Friday) in preparation for today (Saturday). By 6am we started picking each body, decontaminating them further and bagging them — all these were done by the South African team.”
The South Africans, who arrived the country in two aircraft, shunned local facilities and items.
Reacting on the equipment brought into the country by the experts, Obafunwa took a swipe at the Federal Government for its inability to make provisions for forensic science laboratories across the country, the lack of which, he said, had often led to mass burial of dead victims of major disasters in Nigeria.
No comments:
Post a Comment
Please tell us what you think in the comments....