Bus conveying Nigerian evacuees from Sudan catches fire

One of the hired buses conveying stranded Nigerians from Khartoum, the Sudanese capital, to Port Sudan en route to Saudi Arabia has caught fire.

Report said it caught fire in the early hours of Monday.

Twenty-six buses conveying the stranded Nigerians left Al Razi around 12:am on Monday for Port Sudan.

“One of the buses conveying some 50 Nigerian students from Sudan with a tag number (Katsina 1) heading to Port Sudan as part of the second batch of FGN evacuation got damaged due to excessive heat from one of the vehicle’s tyres.

“Dr Hashim Idris Na’Allah, the chairman of the Nigerian Elders’ Forum in Sudan, was one of the passengers in the said bus, which contained a total of 50 students (49 males, 1 female).

“The incident happened around 2:30am Sudan time.

“The driver stopped the bus near an RSF checkpoint just before the tire exploded causing a fire to start.

“All the passengers escaped unhurt. Forty out of the 50 passengers were later distributed to the other buses evacuating the students, while the remaining passengers spent the night where the incident happened alongside the driver at the RSF checkpoint.

“The students said the RSF really did their possible best to help the passengers and offered them with cups of tea in the morning before they left,” Sani Aliyu, who is in Sudan disclosed.

According to reports, they have since continued their journey to Port Sudan.

Over 1000 Nigerians are being evacuated through the Port Sudan route following the difficulties faced in getting the first batch of evacuees across the Egyptian borders.

The stranded Nigerians including children and pregnant women have spent about five days at the borders as the Egyptian officials denied them access into the country where flights are already waiting to airlift them to Nigeria.

Persecondnews reports that on Monday, an unconfirmed report said President Muhammadu Buhari had put a call through to his Egyptian counterpart to allow the stranded Nigerians to pass.