By Marie-Therese Nanlong with agency report
A Pastor with the Kingdom Dominion Chapel Dain Kowa, Jos, Plateau State, Godwin Ejeh, who lost his 18-years old daughter, Shekina, during Tuesday’s twin-bomb blasts in the city has explained that the young woman went to buy some food items when she met her untimely death.

The pastor who is among the very few families to have identified their dead relations said Shekina had completed her secondary school education before the tragic incident. Overwhelmed by emotion, the cleric simply said, “It is well, it is well,” and declined further comments.

However, Governor Jonah Jang of Plateau State visited the scenes of the blasts yesterday, cursing the pepertrators of the dastardly acts.

The Ejeh family members were preparing to take the remains of the deceased to their home town in Kogi State for burial, at the time of this encounter with Saturday Vanguard yesterday.

Shekina was sent to the market to buy some groceries but was caught up in the twin-blasts, he said. However, most family members of the 76 people said to have died in the blast have not found the corpses of their loved ones, as majority of them were in mangled forms. At the time of filing this report, the affected family members were still combing the hospitals in search of them. But some lucky ones who escaped death by the whiskers told Saturday Vanguard that God delivered them from destruction as they could not have escaped on their own.

Biodun Adewusi, who was at the Terminus area to purchase some materials for a wedding she was billed to attend next week, said it was the hand of God that delivered her.

She told Saturday Vanguard, “I know God loves me most and it is not yet my time to die. I woke up feeling very heavy in my spirit on Tuesday. I wanted to just stay at home and sleep but I had to go and get materials for my tailor.
”I prayed to God to lift the spirit of heaviness on me and grant me safe journey. I still wonder why I prayed that way.

”I got to the Terminus and was under the bridge buying some materials but immediately after I left the spot to the premises of First Bank, I heard the first blast. I saw smoke everywhere, my ears were blocked and I felt dizzy. The next thing was that I just sat on the ground.
”I saw people running but I was just there as if watching a film. The fire and the second blast brought me to my senses again and I ran with others towards ECWA Goodnews, from where I found my way home.”
Biodun maintained she could not say how she got out of that place on time even when she was sure that many people at that spot were affected but, “it could only be the prayer that God answered”.

Another survivor, Ali Adamu, dealer in second clothes who could barely express himself said he could only thank ‘’Allah’’ for the deliverance.

Adamu explained he was going to see a partner to collect some goods for sale, pointing out that it was soon after he left the scene of the blasts to Gangare, that he heard the blasts within “very short” intervals. He was grateful that he survived.

Turning philosophical, he asked in Hausa, “Haka Allah ya ke so?” – meaning “is this what God wants?”
This was even as the state governor and factional Chairman of the Nigeria’s Governors’ Forum, NGF, Jonah Jang has berated those he described as sponsors and admirers of terrorists in their midst, describing them as unpatriotic.

He spoke shortly after arriving the state from his trip and inspecting the damages caused by last Tuesday twin bomb blasts in the heart of Jos, the state capital.

He commiserated with the victims and their families stressing, “I have been briefed and the government will foot the bills irrespective of the hospitals the victims received treatment”.

He however, said that those making it impossible for governments to function must realise that nothing else would work if government were crippled.

Jang then, advised all those he said were against President Goodluck Jonathan’s 2015 aspiration to take heart because there was no better alternative.

”Jonathan will win the election clean. Nigerian politicians should stop using everything to gain advantage. We should stop treating our President without respect, we should know the time of emergency, put heads together and offer solution to the problems.

”Everyone should understand that we are in a war situation in the country, there are enemies that are unknown and no one knows when they will attack. We should be vigilant and suspicious of everything, not only cars and avoid rushing to venues of bomb blasts.

”These people (sponsors) are outside Plateau and some from outside Nigeria. When they come here, they don’t stay on trees, they stay in people’s houses and even the bombs are assembled in people’s houses, why can’t we be patriotic enough to report them to the authorities?”

He promised to clear the areas where the incidents occurred adding, “this is not a market and clearing this place will be in everybody’s interest.”

He further described the incidents as “unfortunate and coming at the time we believed that Plateau has overcome this type of situation.”

The governor later visited all the hospitals where the victims were receiving treatment.
Meanwhile, Muslim and Christian clerics in Jos have condemned Tuesday’s twin bomb blasts that killed over 75 people and injured several others in the city.

The Clerics made the condemnation yesterday in Jos during separate interviews with the News Agency of Nigeria, NAN.

Sheikh Sani Yahaya-Jingir, the National Leader of Izala movement, told NAN that the bomb blast must be condemned by all right-thinking people in the country.

“Those that perpetuated this act of killing and maiming innocent citizens must be condemned by people from the two different religions.

“Those that committed this act are certainly not Muslims, because Islam has never directed Muslims to kill innocent followers of any religion.

“Islam has never directed Muslims to force or compel anybody to join the religion, “ he said.
Also speaking to NAN, Bishop Benjamin Kwashe of the Anglican Diocese of Jos, condemned the attacks, saying that the perpetrators were agents of the devil.

“The perpetrators of these dastardly acts that caused the death of innocent citizens are certainly agents of the devil.

“We the religious leaders from both Muslim and Christian sides have been meeting to maintain peace in Jos.
“We have an understanding that our followers should be educated on the need to live peacefully with one another.

“We still thank God that this attack has not set the Muslims and Christians against each other to start killing themselves.

“We will still go back to the drawing board to continue educating our followers to live in peace with one another, “ he said.

Also speaking to NAN, the spokesman of Jamaatul Nasril Islam, JNI, Alhaji Sani Mudi, joined the other religious leaders in condemning the attacks.

“The JNI hereby condemns this heinous act that killed our people and calls on the people to be more vigilant so as to avoid being victims of violence,“ he said.

Mudi called on other clerics to continue working for peace in the state and the country.
As at yesterday, however, business activities were gradually picking up in the city even as the scenes of the incidents were still cordoned off by security agents. However, residents now closed their business premises as early as 4.30pm daily.