Several students have reportedly escaped death as a seriously distressed and worn out hostel structure at government secondary school Numan caved in on Friday killing one student identified as Harka Yinasinma.
Sources at the school said despite its state of dilapidation, the school authorities allowed several students to be sleeping in the building.
“What would have turned to a serious disaster was today averted as most of the students in the hostel were awake when the building collapsed during a heavy windstorm.
” But one student who was not so lucky because he was sleeping at the time, was crushed to death,” a source who do not want his name in print told our reporter.
The source told our reporter that the incident took place in the afternoon on Friday leading to a serious disquiet in the area.
“I can tell you that the hostel that house our children is not even fit to house animals. In fact those buildings are time bomb waiting to explode. We are lucky only one life was lost. Even at that life is such precious that we shoud’nt toil with one. If the children were sleeping, the whole state will have been in a state of mourning by now,” the source said.
Pictures seen by our reporter revealed a very gory and pathetic sight, as most of the buildings were cracked and in a state of serious dilapidation and could have collapsed on their own even without the aide of a windstorm.
Adamawa state government has given education a serious premium in its eleven point agenda.
But stakeholders said a lot need to be done to bring back the lost glory of the sector which suffered heavy neglect in the past.
Efforts to speak with the commissioner of education, Wilbina Jackson and local authorities in Numan before filing this report proved abortive.
