Ekiti Gov. Ayodele Fayose bailed out of his Mercedes-Benz G-Class that first responders said mysteriously caught fire on the Oshodi-Apapa Expressway, Lagos, on Wednesday.
A Lagos State Traffic Management office who witnessed the accident said the accident happened around 1.30pm on the Oshodi-Apapa Expressway inward Airport Road. It happened on the Oshodi bridge, not too far from the LASTMA’s headquarters.
“We cannot tell the exact cause of the fire. We gathered from those at the scene that the governor was in the G-Class when the accident happened and he quickly escaped into another car in his convoy.
“On getting to the scene, we saw the driver who tried to cover his face with a Fez cap. He watched helplessly as the fire raged on. We alerted the state fire service and LASEMA. The LASEMA response unit had to take one way to access the accident scene because the road was blocked because of the inferno.
“On arrival, they were able to douse the fire. The vehicle was seriously burnt. The driver did not talk to anybody. We saw as he started packing some of the burnt cash in the car.
They were N500 notes. He packed the money with some other items into a polythene bag.
This was in the presence of traffic officials and the police. We later cleared the traffic as the carcass of the car was towed away by LASEMA.”
Special Assistant to Fayose on New Media and Public Communications Lere Olayinka later said the governor was not in the car.
In a statement issued on Wednesday, Olayinka explained that Fayose was heading for the Lagos airport when the car got burnt.