One of the vehicles and angry youths.
| credits: Mudiaga Affe
| credits: Mudiaga Affe
One of the vans in a convoy of three Toyota Hilux pick-up vans belonging to Julius Berger Nigeria Plc on Sunday killed two children at Ugep, headquarters of Yakurr Local Government Area, Cross River State.
The van, with number plate, Abuja RBC 702 XA, was said to have rammed into the underage children, who were waiting to cross the busy Calabar-Ikom Highway while returning from church after the Sunday service.
An eyewitness, who identified himself as Solomon Okonta, said the incident happened at about 3.30pm.
Okonta said the driver of the Hilux and his passenger, a foreigner whose name could not be ascertained as of press time, were beaten by some youths before the intervention of the police.
He said the driver was later taken to the police station, while the foreigner was taken to a church in the area for refuge.
“The police intervention led to the rescue of the foreigner from the youths who were bent on lynching him,” he said.
It was gathered that the Divisional Police Officer of Ugep division led his men to restore peace in the area.
The DPO, whose name could not be confirmed, lamented that the youths would have killed the driver and the foreigner if not for the intervention of the police.
“The problem we faced was how to rescue the white man. We had problem of lack of patrol van and none of the officers was ready to use their private vehicle to where angry youths were. So, it took us a while to disperse them,” he said.
When contacted, the Public Relations Officer in charge of the Cross River State Police Command, Mr. Hogan Bassey, confirmed the incident.
He said the situation had been brought under control and investigation was ongoing.
“We can confirm that the van killed two children and some youths wanted to lynch the occupants. We had brought the situation under control and investigation is ongoing,” he said.
