Taiwo Popoola
Four people have reportedly died after a trailer fell into a ditch along the old Oyo-Ogbomosho Road.
Urban Express News Online learnt that several other people also sustained various degrees of injuries as a result of the accident that occurred on Thursday night.
The incident, according to sources, happened at the Emaayo-Seminary area in Ogbomosho.
The trailer, travelling from Oyo towards Ilorin, reportedly fell into a ditch at a badly damaged portion of the road. Its passengers were thrown off and trapped under it till Friday morning.
The new Ibadan-Oyo-Ogbomosho-Ilorin expressway has been under construction since 2001.
An Ogbomoso indigene who identified himself as Kolapo said: “Several appeals have been made to governments and other relevant agencies at both state and federal levels to repair the road in a standard way and ensure the new Ibadan-Ilorin highway is completed. But they have turned deaf ears, unresponsive and unconcerned about what people go through.”
“The damaged portion within Ogbomoso metropolis is less than 500 metre long, yet, despite the cries for government’s intervention spanning almost a year now, it has not received attention. Several communal interventions have only offered temporary relief.”
He further accused the state government of neglecting Ogbomosho, saying: “The Oyo-Iseyin road is a federal government road; its reconstruction was executed by the present Oyo State government when the Federal Government refused to do so. That is a road stretching tens of kilometres. Why can’t the state government come to our rescue in this one too, a stretch that’s less than 500m?”
