The strange death killing prominent people in Kano appears to be getting worse as a Professor of Mass Communication at the Bayero University, Kano, Balarabe Maikaba, died on Sunday in Kano.
Details of his death were not available but according to a family source, funeral prayer was held for the deceased at 4 pm at his family house, near Plaza cinema, Fagge quarters in Kano city.
In the last one week, scores of prominent sons of the State, have been lost to a yet-to-be-identified disease, with Dala, Fagge, Tarauni, Nasarawa, Gwale, and Kano Municipal worst hit.
Among those already buried are academics, administrators, bankers, media practitioners, and businessmen.
Eyewitnesses and undertakers at the various cemeteries across the State said that an unprecedented number of people had died and were buried over the past few days.
Among the prominent persons that died in Kano on Saturday were Prof Ibrahim Ayagi, Prof Aliyu Umar Dikko of Physiology Department, Bayero University Kano and elder brother to former Chief of Air Staff, Air Marshal Mohammed Dikko Umar (rtd), Dr Musa Umar Gwarzo, Alhaji Dahiru Rabiu (former Grand Khadi), Musa Tijjani (Editor of Triumph Newspaper) and Adamu Isyaku Dal, who was a former Executive Secretary of the State Universal Basic Education Board.
Others are Alhaji Salisu Lado, Hajiya Shamsiyya Mustapha, Hajiyaj Nene Umma, Alhaji Garba Sarki Fagge, Dr Nasiru Maikano Bichi, Secretary Student Affairs, North West University and Ado Gwanja’s mother, among others.
Meanwhile, Coalition of United Political Parties (CUPP) want the Federal Government to declare national health emergency in Kano over the mysterious deaths in the State.
Claiming that Kano State has recorded about 700 deaths in the last three days, CUPP expressed fears that it might spread to other States if not contained.
The Spokesperson of the coalition, Mr Ikenga Imo Ugochinyere, in a statement on Sunday demanded total lockdown of the State to avoid the migration of infected people to neighbouring States.
“We demand that nobody is allowed to leave or enter into Kano State until the growing rate of the infection is contained, infected people identified, isolated and treated and their contacts identified. With alleged reports that the Commissioner of Health, the Permanent Secretary and other functionaries of the Ministry of Health are also infected leaves the state without it first line of administrative defence as that line had already been taken out by the virus,” CUPP stated.
Ugochinyere also called on the Federal Government to takeover the management of management of Kano COVID-19 issues, as it has shown that the state could not contain the crisis.
“It is against these reports that we issue an emergency advisory to President Muhammadu Buhari to take the Kano situation as a national emergency and deploy all available arsenals to bring it under control. The Kano situation is obviously going to be the real test for Nigeria’s fight against the virus. Nigeria will be consumed if there are delayed actions on Kano to cut the chain of spread.
“It is clear that due to cultural and religious practices, commercial nature of the town, population, literacy level and the pervading poverty level among a huge chunk of the population and other competing factors, Kano is a high risk area to allow the virus to overwhelm. With the current trend, any delay in tackling the Kano trend is a danger signal which must not be allowed to happen,” the coalition warned.
The opposition coalition said the President should immediately order a lockdown of Kano State and deploy military, police and other security agencies to enforce it.
It further demanded that public schools and public buildings should be converted to emergency hostels and evacuate all the homeless children and orphans roaming the streets of Kano till the virus is contained
“We advise the governors of states sharing borders with Kano to immediately ensure strict no entry or exit into Kano for 14 days,” CUPP said, adding that delay in the lockdown and urgent containment might push people to want to escape from Kano to safer places thereby carrying the virus beyond the borders of the state like it happened in Italy following a delayed lockdown of Lombardy region in Northern Italy.
