As residents of affected communities continue to count their losses, both human and material, in the Sunday morning explosion in Lagos State, a leading rights lawyer, Femi Falana, has written to demand a coroner inquest into the death of the 17 persons, lost to the incident.
In a letter dated March 18, 2020, addressed to the Chief Coroner, High Court of Lagos State, Justice M.A. Dada, the senior advocate of Nigeria said he was relying on the law setting up the coroner system in the state, which says that an inquest shall hold whenever a Coroner is informed that the death of a deceased person within his district was a result of death “in a violent, unnatural or suspicious situation.”
The letter signed by him reads: “On Sunday, March 15, 2020, an explosion rocked Ado in the Amuwo Odofin Local Government Area of Lagos State. The explosion led to an inferno which killed 17 people and destroyed about 50 houses.
“We are aware that the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) has blamed the explosion on gas explosion which occurred after a truck hit some gas cylinders stacked in a gas processing plant located near the corporation’s System 2B Pipeline Right of Way.
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“We have, however, confirmed that the resulting fire later spread to the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) oil pipeline passing through the area which aggravated the explosion.
“In the light of the foregoing, we request you to use your good offices to cause a coroner’s inquest to be conducted into the cause of the said explosion and make appropriate recommendations pursuant to Section 15 of the Lagos State Coroner’s Law 2007 which provides that an inquest shall hold whenever a Coroner is informed that the death of a deceased person within his District was a result of death ‘in a violent, unnatural or suspicious situation.’
A pall of doubt has been cast on the official reasons being adduced for the tragedy by various testimonies from eye-witnesses.
During the inquest, testimonies and pieces of evidence would be used in arriving at the most plausible cause(s) of the incident.
and then