Governor Seyi Makinde has revealed that the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) certificate of a mining company indicted for the explosion that rocked the Bodija area of Oyo State on Tuesday, January 16, showed some foreign names as owners. The governor disclosed this during an interview with Channels TV. He also said the death toll in the unfortunate blast had risen to three as one more victim died in a hospital on Wednesday, January 17.
“We recovered one individual alive today (Wednesday) under the rubble. 60 of the 77 people hospitalized have been discharged. We are trying to uncover the identities of the people. We’ve done a few fact-finding on the company involved and yes, there are indeed some foreign names on the CAC documents of the company involved but these are still early days. We don’t have anything to cover,” he said. Makinde said the state has identified an individual of interest that security agents should be inviting for questioning. “It is not anything that has to do with banditry and insurgency but illegal miners that stored explosives in a residential area,” the governor clarified. He said the state government has no reason to cover up and that the people of the state should trust his administration. The governor added that he would seek presidential approval for miners to store explosives with the military, and would sign an executive order in the coming days to that effect.