A chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Kano State, Bar. Abdulsalami Ginsau, who was recently elected as State Assistant Organising Secretary of the party, died in the early hours of Friday after falling into an elevator shaft at an Abuja hotel in the Utako area of the city.
It was gathered that contrary to earlier reports that Ginsau died after being trapped inside the hotel elevator, the Kano APC chieftain fell into the elevator pit after the lift had been damaged by unruly delegates who came from a northern state for the party’s recent national convention in Abuja.
Ginsau, who was lodged on the third floor of the hotel, stepped out of his room at about 6:30 am and walked straight to the elevator, unaware that the lift had malfunctioned.
A security source, who asked not to be named as investigation was ongoing, disclosed that Ginsau, who was recently elected as State Assistant Organising Secretary of the APC in Kano, stepped out of his room on the third floor and headed to the elevator at 6:30am unaware that the lift had malfunctioned and was on the fourth floor and stepped into the lift shaft that had become void.
“It is a sad development. But from what we saw, the deceased could have been saved if the two young men who were loitering in the hallway and saw him fall into the shaft had raised the alarm. Rather, they and others who came around when the incident happened simply wrung their hands and left without informing the hotel staffers of what had happened,” the source stated.
“From preliminary findings, the hotel was overrun by delegates and party members from Kano State. How can you book 150 rooms and have almost 2,000 people showing up and behaving rascally and threatening hotel staff?
“From what we have reviewed, the lift that should have 6-8 persons was crammed with 12-14 persons. The party members refused to adhere to instructions and kept threatening hotel staff that tried to direct them on proper protocol.”
A senior staff member of the hotel, who declined to comment officially as she said the matter was under police investigation, expressed regret about the development but stated that the delegates and participants did not conduct themselves properly and failed to inform the hotel management of the unfortunate fall.
She said they were cooperating with the police on the development and expressed the management’s deepest condolences to the family of the deceased, as well as the Government and People of Kano State, stressing that the hotel was reviewing its operational guidelines to avert any future occurrence.
Our correspondent learnt that the matter was reported to the Utako police division and the FCT Police Command who carried out forensics before evacuating the corpse.
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