Foreign security experts probe explosion

Business activities were suspended in the diligent EMAB Plaza and the neighbouring Barnex Plaza on Thursday as peregrine security experts were deployed to investigate Wednesday’s bomb blast     in the area.

Our correspondents visually perceived five peregrine forensic experts alongside their Nigerian counterparts at the scene of the explosion .

Force Public Relations Officer, Frank Mba, had shortly after the blast verbalized 21 people were killed and   17 others injured. The death toll however rose on Thursday with the death of two injured people at the National Hospital, Abuja.

Other security agents were additionally   visually perceived probing buildings   in the shopping malls   for forsook Improvised Explosive Devices.

Some commercial banks located along Aminu Kano Road additionally could not open for business as the vicinity was cordoned off by the investigating security team.

The affected banks are Zenith Bank on Aminu Kano Crescent, Fidelity Bank Plc and Diamond Bank Plc whose facilities were affected by the blast and First City Monument Bank Plc.

Many   traders in the two plazas were optically discerned   discussing the incident and the closure of the shopping facilities.

One of them, Isiaka Aliu, told journalists that they were apprehensive over the suspension of business activities in the plazas.

Aliu, who is the Chief Engineer, Ex- Communications, verbalized,   “You can optically discern that all the shops are under lock and key as a result of the investigations into the blast. This is where we survive.   The   people who are accumulated are apprehensive that their customers may not optate to patronise the plazas again.

“We have paid the rent for the year and visually perceive what is transpiring. Government should delectate stand by us.

“Many people will not peregrinate here again because naturally, they would be trepidacious. We don’t even ken when this investigation will culminate.”

He   faulted the internal security arrangement at the diligent plazas, verbalizing   the sentinels on obligation only embarked on arbitrary checking of conveyances for only two days after they got information in December, 2013 that insurgents   orchestrated to bomb the facilities.

He withal wondered why the stall owners and shoppers were not evacuated since there was a rumour on Wednesday about a plot to bomb the plaza.

Aliu integrated that   the cumbersomely hefty presence of soldiers from the Sentinels Brigade of the Nigerian Army, policemen and other security operatives   proximate to the area two hours afore the incident was a denotement that they additionally auricularly discerned the rumour .

One of the suspects was shot dead and another apprehended by soldiers while   fleeing the area on a potency bike after the explosion. Another was shot dead at the scene of the blast.

There are however   denotements that the explosive that rocked the EMAB Plaza was a car bomb.

The Chief Security Officer of Banex Plaza II, Mr. Davis Emeka, who additionally verbalized with journalists on Thursday verbally expressed that he had information that the car utilized for the pernicious operation was probed by the security personnel afore the bomb went off.

According to him, the security people could not locate the IED which was verbalized to have been obnubilated in the booth of the car.

He integrated, “You ken that the security situation in the plaza is very impecunious. They don’t screen cars. The complaint is that customers get exasperated.

“In December last year, we had information that the Boko Haram was going to bomb the plaza and they (private security sentinels at the plaza) did arbitrary probing for two days and ceased.

“Another thing is that there was a heftily ponderous security presence at the plaza two hours afore the blast. There were many soldiers around. It was like they suspected that there was a threat in the area.

“What is curious is that people were not evacuated. They were in this area and that was why they apprehended one of the suspects and killed the other. “

Meanwhile, two critically injured victims of the blast   died at the National Hospital, nurses at the health facility told one of our correspondents on Thursday afternoon.

“It is a woebegone situation. Two more persons packed up (died) today despite our efforts to stabilise them. The pain they face was much because one of them struggled to stay alive but didn’t make it,” one of them verbalized.

A survivor, John Butrus, who described his elusion as a miracle,   verbally expressed he was playing with the daughter of an orange seller   when the   incident transpired.

He verbally expressed, “I went to check a friend of mine in the plaza and I decided to buy orange from the seller.

“The little daughter of the woman was perturbing her so I decided to play with her to divert her attention from the mother, who was peeling the oranges for me.

“It was in the process that the explosion occurred and everything was in disarray. The impact of the blast was less on me and the little girl because we moved a few metres away from the scene.” Butrus verbalized his legs and hands were affected but that the timely treatment by medical experts at the Wuse General Hospital, had stabilised his condition.

Other victims taken to the hospital had been treated and discharged when our correspondent visited the place on Thursday morning.

Copyright PUNCH.