Mass exodus as earth tremor hits Nigeria again, schools, businesses shut down – Gobroadsheet
//Tremor: Shola Ojo,//
ABOUT 10 days after the first two experiences, earth tremor on Tuesday hit Kwoi, headquarters of Jaba Local Government Area of Kaduna State, Northwest Nigeria again, forcing locals to flee their homes in their numbers for safety.
It was gathered that, the Tuesday incident forced many people who had earlier claimed to be hardhearted eventually took to their heel to seek refuge in neighbouring communities.
However, experts at the Kaduna State University (KASU) have said that the constant incident of earth tremor in Kwoi town may give way to a major earthquake, urging the government to place the community on a watch list for a possible evacuation of residents in the near future.
The KASU Head of Geography Department, Dr. Idowu Innocent Abbas said, though government has mobilized experts to investigate incident, there was need to place the community under watch in order to prevent a devastation that may follow a bigger earth tremor.
According to him, “It is unfortunate that the tremor happened but it is not unusual. This is because it can happen anywhere and at any time as long as there is movement underneath the earth surface. It can happen anywhere, it is just unfortunate that it happened in Kwoi”.
“The tremor could be a signal for a bigger incident in Kwoi. And it still depends on what happens within the earth surface. I think the Nigerian Space, Research and Development Agency (NASRDA) is already looking into that”, stressing, “honestly speaking earth tremor is a small earth quake, the major earth quake could come”.
That yesterday’s incident came with a heavy vibration at about 9am, after an earlier ones on Monday at about 3am and 6am, while forcing schools to shut their gates and asked students to return to their homes and several residents making frantic moves to evacuate their families from the troubled community.
A community leader in Fada, who resides close to the Chief of Jaba’s Palace, Mallam Suleiman Yakubu who in an interview said, “Today (Tuesday) the tremor happened again. And today’s tremor was very loud more than the previous ones. Some schools were forced to close and they sent their students back home”.
Yakubu while narrating the account of the devastating level of the tremor pointed out that among the schools that were immediately shut down included, “Mallam Maude school, LEA Central primary school and Sabzuro Primary school which were forced to close as a result of the sound of the tremor”, pointing out that “They were afraid that something worse may happened”.
“The heavy vibration of the tremor happened around 9 am yesterday. It also occurred on Monday, around 3am and 6 am. The sound of Monday’s tremor was not as loud and devastating as the one of this morning. It has now become part of the life of the people in the area, unlike when it happened last time when people were running helter skitter, and running away from the town”.
Yakubu argued that, “The few people that are still in town are those that didn’t want to leave and they are now contemplating leaving and following their other relations to run away. People have been calling from Kaduna and other places that they should be evacuated, and they are pleading on government to do something before a serious tremor happened”.
“But, the Chief palace workers and some government officials are pleading that we should stay put. I don’t know the rationale behind this staying put. The Jaba local Government caretaker committee Chairman, Mr. Ben Kure is saying that people should be calm and stay where they are. But, the people are already frightened and they are in shock. And when you are in shock and this thing keep on happening what do you do?”
“When the incident happened again today, many of us who were thinking otherwise before have decided to leave the town, especially the women and children. We want to leave. This is because some have been told that they don’t know probably the whole town might sink. And the government is not doing anything for now to evacuate people”.
“Somebody in government was telling us that they will bring canopies; emergency hospitals should in case if the unknown happens. But, what will be the use of those things? It will be a case of medicine after death. What will be the use if they don’t bring them now? I think the best the government can do for use now is to make plans for evacuation of the people here. This tremor happened inside the town and it is still happening”.
But a community leader in Kwoi, Mallam Yakubu who urged for the immediate intervention of Government to save lives and properties in Kwoi community, said, “This is where thousands of people are living. So, if you don’t take care now, is it until when a larger problem happened? We are begging government to wake up to its own responsibility”.