32 years after military plane crash, widows of victims lament neglect

WIDOWS of military officers who died in a 1992 plane crash in Oke- Afa,

Ejigbo area of Lagos State, have called on the Federal Government and the Defence Headquarters for support, stating that since the incident nearly 32 years ago, all entitlements meant for the late officers were yet to be paid to the families.

It would recalled that on September 26, 1992, a military plane, Hercules C- 130, conveying 163 people, who were middle- ranking army, navy and air force officers attending a staff college course in Northern Nigeria had crashed about five minutes after taking off from Lagos, then, the nation’s capital. The widows spoke in Port Harcourt during the visit of the President of Defence and Police Officers' Wives Association ( DEPOWA) who is wife of the Chief of Defence Staff, Mrs. Oghogho Musa, for distribution of palliatives to wives of fallen heroes, which is an initiative of Department of Civil/ Military Relationship in conjunction with Office of the Wife of the CDS in commemoration of the 2024 Arm Forces Remembrance Day.

Oghogho, received by the General Officer Commanding, 6 Division Nigeria Army, Major- Gen, Jamal Abdussalam, distributed cartons of noddles, bags of rice, beans and other foodstuff to the widows.

Speaking in her vote of thanks, one of the beneficiaries, Mrs. Folake Lasisi, wife of late Lt.- Commander Lasisi, of the Nigeria Navy, regretted that the entitlements meant for widows of the soldiers who died in the 1992 plane crash have not been released to the families.

Lasisi said many of the widows who were expecting the entitlements have died, calling on the FG and Defence Headquarters to review the