A roadside car dealership, Adekunle Adeyemo, has disclosed he lost no fewer than 14 vehicles worth N32m in a tanker explosion that occurred at Kara Bus Stop on Lagos-Ibadan Expressway on November 7.

The 49-year-old, who has five dependents – a wife, three children and his mother, said the incident affected his livelihood.

He explained that he lost two second-hand buses, one Mazda and one Hyundai; four tokunbo Mazda cars; two Toyota Picnic minivans; two Toyota Corollas; and two Mazda pickups in the incident, adding that the shock affected his memory.

He said,

“The worth of all the cars is N32m. I am still in the process of recovering from the loss. As I am, I have lost my memory. I am slowly trying to regain my memory and get back to my old self. I don’t know how Nigerians can help me.

“This money is not even mine. I got the cars with loans from the bank and cooperative society. I gathered all the money to get the cars from Europe and the United States of America.”

He added,

The two fairly used were commercial vehicles. Those are the ones I used to take care of my family. When the drivers were done for the day, I would ask them to park them on the lot for the night, until the next morning. Both of them were gutted in the fire.

Narrating how the incident unveiled on the fateful day, Adeyemo, who said he got his vehicles directly from the US, Belgium and Germany, said:

“It was on November 7, 2020. I got a call at home in Magboro, Ogun State at 1.45am. I saw the call from a strange number and said, ‘Who is this?’ It turned out to be one of my boys who spends the night on the lot. In fact, his handset got burnt in the fire; it was God that saved him. He was in one of the buses when the explosion happened sometime after 1am. Before he was able to gather himself, it was 1.45am. I got here at 2.10am. I saw everything on fire.

“The motor boy and the driver died on the spot. I saw the bodies. We carried the bodies after the fire had been quenched. They were burnt beyond recognition. We just know it was two people.”

Adeyemo’s plight is compounded because he does not have insurance for the burnt vehicles.

According to him, the environmental protection agency has taken all the scraps and sold the vehicles for N50,000 each.

The father of four, who has sold cars at the Kara Bus Stop for around eight years, said he had no idea something of that magnitude would happen to him.

He added that he needs help and will not mind any help from the government.