ADELOWO OLADIPO reports the bomb blasts that threw the town of Madalla into mourning, killing over 30 Christian faithful and maiming many others at St Theresa  Catholic Church on the morning of Christmas.

A 13-year old Chidimma Maduka last Sunday morning  missed death by the whiskers as she narrowly escaped being killed in the explosions by bombs planted  by the dreaded  Boko Haram sect at St. Theresa  Catholic Church, Madalla in Suleja Local Government of Niger State that left no fewer than about  38 people among whom were three policemen dead with additional 80 people suffering varying degrees of injuries and are being treated on the bills of the Federal Government at various hospitals in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory after being rescued from the scenes of the blasts  by the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA).

The decision of the young girl who is a pupil of Capital Secondary School, Kuje to have insisted that she wanted to fix her apparently unkempt hair before going to attend the mass at the church against the instruction of her parents was responsible for her being alive today.

The outright disobedience on her part   could also be attributed to a divine intervention as her parents were not so lucky on the fateful day as they perished in the blasts alongside one of her siblings. They were part of the congregation that attended that church service.

Call it a divine intervention or  a date with destiny, Chidimma, now an orphan, related this experience to the Saturday Tribune in an interview, saying that her decision to have insisted  that she must plait her hair first while listening to her heart and not her parents saved her from being killed prematurely  by the dreaded Boko Haram’s bomb.

Chidimma, who is now oblivious of what life holds in stock for her since the sad occurrence last Sunday, is taking everything in its stride.

She said that when it dawned on her parents, Francis and Jennifer Maduka that she (Chidimma) was not ready to go with them to the church that fateful morning, her late mother, in annoyance, dropped some money and urged her to prepare all the food items bought for the celebration of Christmas.

Saturday Tribune, however, gathered that her late parents and the two siblings, an elder sister and younger brother, had no premonition of their tragic end that fateful morning as they all left for church full of hope.

Chidimma said she was at the salon doing her hair when she heard an ear deafening sound that rented the air.

The news of the blasts also spread fast among the residents. Chidimma, gripped with fear, dashed out to the church where she saw the charred remains of her parents and two siblings clustered together in a car that was trapped in the explosion.

“As I was about getting to the church to make enquiry, I saw my dad’s car and everybody in the car was dead. The first person I identified was my sister. I saw my parents in the front seat, all burnt in the car. The only thing I recalled was that some people came and dragged me away from my father’s burnt car,” she said.

A security man employed by the church, Raphael Francis, aged 30, said he was busy at the gate of the church directing traffic when he suddenly saw a Toyota car (Camry Lee Saloon, golden colour) coming towards the church as the congregation started trooping out after the service. He said the driver of the vehicle, who he identified as suspected suicide bomber, was mindless of the busy nature of the road as he drove at top speed while the congregation was trooping out of the church.

To Francis, the driver of the car might have been heading towards the pedestrian gate where he was standing controlling the movement of the members of the church, but before he could realise what was going on, he saw the car crushing some people and what followed was a big bang which tossed him up before hitting the ground heavily.

According to him, thrice he hit the ground before he got up and ran to safety. He said after the terrific sound, he saw several dead bodies behind him while the entire area was engulfed in flame, adding that people were flunged into different directions while others were deposited on top of roofs of some residential buildings around the church.

Francis, who sustained some injuries on his head, said he was not more than 10 metres away from the bomb laden car which later got exploded.

The leader of the church, Parish Priest, Reverend Farther Isaac Achi, who said he did not conduct the early morning mass for the Christian faithful in the church that fateful day, however, disclosed that the blasts affected mostly those who left the church earlier after the mass.

“The casualty would have been more, but because many stayed behind to collect some souvenir from my assistant, Rev. Fr. Christopher Barde Jatau, who led the mass. It was in the course of receiving this souvenir that many of them remained inside the church but those who left immediately after the mass became victims of the explosion,” the parish priest added.

He explained that the church was yet to ascertain the number of casualties recorded, adding that plans were under way to inform all the church members to help in taking census of all those that had travelled and those that had attended the service so as to have an authentic statistics on the figure of those that lost their lives owing to the tragedy.

He said this little girl sitting by my side, referring to Chidimma, lost her entire family. She was the only one in the family that is among the living today, adding that one other woman who could not come to church also lost her husband and all her children in the blast.

“If you had come to the church premises around 8a.m, there were many corpses on the ground. Some had to be removed from the roof tops while some others were removed from the trees. Some of those that were rushed to nearby hospitals were unable to make it before needed attention could get to them,” he added.

According to him, there were some of the victims that were hospitalised in Suleja, Zuba and Gwagwalada while some others were receiving treatment in private hospitals here in Mandalla.

However, commercial motorcyclists, cart water vendors, tea and suya joints proprietors were not spared by the bomb explosions as their charred remains were noticed as well as the wreckages of their motorcycles and carts.

The Emir of Suleja, Alhaji Auwal Ibrahim, while condoling the Bishop of Minna Dioceses lamented the loss of the country’s values, saying that “our society must go back to the hitherto norms and values by using the traditional leaders in the security management of the country.”

He also enjoined faithful of both religions (Islam and Christianity) to embraces the teaching of the holy scriptures and make the supreme laws of the two holy books to be the guiding principle of life, saying people should embark on prayers for peace to be restored in the country.