by Kolapo Olapoju
74 out of the 85 corpses of South Africans who died in the 12 September building collapse at the Synagogue church of all nations, have been flown home to South Africa by officials of the country’s on the night of Saturday, 15 November.
The bodies, which had been at the mortuaries of the Mainland Hospital, Yaba, and Isolo General Hospital, Isolo, under the care of the Lagos State government, were flown out of Nigeria via chartered planes around midnight on Saturday.
A minister in the Presidency, Mr. Jeff Radebe, who led the country’s repatriation delegation disclosed, while speaking at a press briefing in Lagos, stated that the process of identifying all the corpses from the Synagogue building collapse had not been completed.
He said: “Of the 85 South Africans, we have received 74 bodies from Lagos State government and would be flown to South Africa at 10:50 pm from the Murtala Muhammed International Airport, MMIA, to arrive at the early hours of Sunday (today). This would be through a chartered plane.”
“And on arrival at the airport, short ceremony would be organised for the victims and the bodies would be handed over to their relatives. The process of identifying all the 85 victims including the three from Zimbabwe has not ended.”
According to him, those identified were through DNA test, adding that, “The test would be conducted to identify others who died in the tragedy.”
Radebe said, “Of the 26 persons who were injured and repatriated to South Africa, 20 have been discharged after they have been certified okay by our medical experts.”
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