On December 27, 2011, Asibi Lawal, a Muslim trader in Sapele, Delta State, closed her store at about 5.00 p.m. She had another usual routine assignment before she finally retired home for the day. She headed for Kings Street, off Urhobo Road, where she organises an Islamic extramural lesson for pupils in a make-shift caravan.

As usual, the lesson commenced at about 6.20 p.m, but three hours later into the session, the unexpected happened.

According to Creeks and South East’s investigations, a yet-to-be identified occupants of a Toyota Camry drove to the frontage of the make-shift venue of the lesson, slowed down and threw a bomb in the direction of the caravan at about 9.12 p.m.

There was an explosion, which threw some of the about 50 pupils in different directions. By the time the dust of the loud bang subsided, six of the pupils of the Islamic school and Asibi Lawal, their teacher, were writhing in pains, resulting from various degrees of injuries they sustained.

The explosion was massive and the assailants were even said to have moved a distance and stopped to assess the impact of their action before they escaped from the scene.    
The explosion, according to a witness, occurred three hours after the commencement of the day’s lessons and one-and-half hours before closing time.

Creeks and South East gathered that the victims were identified as Asisat Hassan;  Saidat Muhammed;  Xlare Jemilat, all females and Asibi Lawal (the woman).

A senior security officer at the scene confirmed that the explosive used was a dynamite, but the Divisional Police Officer of Sapele, Mr Emmanuel Ighodalo, declined to make comments.

He, however, said all necessary information about the incident had been conveyed   to the state Police Public Relations Officer, Mr. Charles Muka, whose duty it was to address the press on  the incident.

Incidentally, security officials from Abuja were in Sapele  to investigate the cause of the December 10, 2011 Hausa mosque bomb blast, when the latest incident occurred.

Following the impact of the blast and the spate of insecurity in the country, top security chiefs in the state rushed to the scene and after assessing the situation immediately entered into an emergency security meeting in Sapele before leaving the town for Asaba, the state capital.

The Chief Imam of Sapele Central Mosque, Alhaji Mohammed Usman said, “The blast was targeted to exterminate the Muslim pupils and called on the government to increase security alert around the Muslim community in Sapele”.

A Muslim faithful, who sought anonymity, told Creeks and South East that the blast was a retaliatory attack on the Muslim sect that bombed the Central Mosque, three weeks ago.

According to him, “The Muslim children school attacked on Tuesday night is mainly attended by children of the rival Muslim worshippers and mosque situated about 300 yards away from the Central Mosque, Sapele.”

The following day, undercover security agents stormed the ancient town to unravel the cause of the bomb blast.

Creeks and South East observed the presence of the security agents at the scene of the blast, retrieving shrapnel of the bomb and other items that would help in their investigations.

It was gathered that the undercover agents were executing the investigations in conjunction with other security agencies, particularly the police and the operatives of the Joint Task Force (JTF).

“We have commenced full scale investigations into the blast that occurred at the Islamic School in Sapele. We will definitely get to the root of the blast and try to see if we can apprehend the perpetrators,” a security source disclosed.

It was reliably learnt that the bomb blast was a retaliatory attack by a group of Muslims in the town against the faction that detonated an explosive at the main mosque, Sapele, on December 10 last year.

Delta State PPRO, ASP Muka, confirmed that only seven children were injured and that it was an insignificant explosion from a contrived device.

He said the incident occurred while the pupils were reportedly being taught Arabic studies and the police was investigating the incident.

One of the affected children was nevertheless, learnt to be gasping for breath at the University of Benin Teaching Hospital, Benin City, Edo State.

The ever busy Sapele General Hospital could neither receive nor treat most of the victims, who were later rushed to Delta State University Teaching Hospital, Oghara, where they were attended to.

Chief Medical Director of the Sapele General Hospital, Dr Omo Aghoja, confirmed that three of the bomb victims were received for treatment in the hospital, though newsmen were not allowed to see them.

A number of the victims were also admitted at the University of Benin Teaching Hospital for treatment.

Days after the Tuesday night blast, scores of sympathisers from the indigenous non-muslim communities in the area were still trooping to the Hausa community in sympathy over the incident.

Investigations indicated that the Saturday, December 10 bomb blast at the Hausa Mosque and the December 27 explosion at the Islamic School were the products of internal wrangling among the muslim worshippers in Sapele, following a disagreement over the mode of sermons in the mosques.

A worshipper, Buhari Akarami, told Creeks and South East that there is a serious disagreement among the worshippers in the mosque over the Friday sermon, noting that the Chief Imam of the Mosque recently devised a means of translating the Friday sermon into English and Hausa in addition to Arabic.

He was said to have introduced that method because he wants a large number of the worshippers, who cannot understand Arabic, to listen and understand the translated version of the sermon in both Hausa and English, but some other worshippers opposed it, insisting that it was alien to Islam.

“Those who are opposed to translating the sermon have since stopped praying in the mosque, while the few who remained are always criticising the translation of the sermon. On the eve of the blast, which was a Friday, the Imam still translated the sermon in Hausa and English and was again criticised by those opposed to the translation. On the day of the blast, two people just passed near the mosque when suddenly the blast occurred.

“Some of us are blaming the blast on the internal crisis in the mosque and suspect that the two unidentified people who passed by the mosque might have thrown the bomb at us,” he added.

The deputy chairman of the mosque committee, Alhaji Yunusa Ismaila Muhammed Loko, however, disagreed, noting that there is no crisis among the worshippers in the Mosque that could warrant such attack. He said the worshippers were of the view that some passersby might have thrown a bomb into the mosque.

It was this blast that was being linked to the Islamic School bombing, which is being seen as a reprisal attack by rival group within the Muslim community in Sapele.

The question on the lips of residents, however, is why resorting to bombings to settle scores among this religious group in the town?