It’s become an all too common scene on Nigeria’s roads: A truck driver losing control of a fuel tanker. Residents rushing to collect the spilled gasoline, a pricey commodity. An explosion turning into a deadly inferno.
Such an incident in northern Nigeria on Tuesday left more than 90 people dead and at least 50 others injured, the latest in a series of similar catastrophes in a country where road accidents with death tolls in the dozens occur nearly every month.
Although road-related deaths in Nigeria are below Africa’s average, 5,000 people died and 31,000 others were injured in traffic accidents in the country last year, according to the government’s data. Poorly maintained roads, aging vehicles and loosely enforced safety regulations such as adherence to speed limits or use of safety belts have all been cited among the causes.
In early September, at least 59 people died when a passenger truck and two other vehicles hit a toppled-over fuel tanker that had caught fire. In April, more than 100 vehicles burned in a similar explosion. And in July last year, at least eight people died as they were trying to siphon off fuel from an overturned truck in the country’s southwest.
The episode on Tuesday night was set off when the driver of a fuel tanker swerved to avoid colliding with a truck on an expressway in the northern state of Jigawa, according to Lawan Shiisu, a police spokesman.
The tanker overturned, spilling fuel onto the roadway. Then, residents from the town of Majia rushed to scoop it up, in what seemed like an easy way to collect an increasingly expensive commodity in Nigeria, where fuel prices have spiked in recent months.
For decades, Nigerians had access to some of the cheapest gasoline in Africa, thanks to a government fuel subsidy. But because that cost has amounted to up to a quarter of the country’s import bill, the government has moved to abandon the subsidy.
That has been a key factor behind nationwide protests over the rising cost of living, which Nigerians blame in part on the end of the gasoline subsidy, that have embroiled the country for months. Gas prices in the country have more than tripled over the last year, while the naira, the national currency, has lost more than 70 percent of its value.
On Tuesday, despite police warnings and attempts to cordon off the area around the overturned tanker, according to Mr. Shiisu, many people continued collecting the fuel.
“The tanker, loaded with petrol, ignited shortly after the crash, causing an inferno that engulfed numerous people in the vicinity,” Mr. Shiisu said.
Videos shared by Nigerian news outlets showed a truck engulfed in flames and a trail of fire along the road.
Mr. Shiisu said the death toll was likely to rise, given that several of the injured were in critical condition.
According to a World Health Organization report published this year, sub-Saharan African countries accounted for nearly 20 percent of road fatalities globally in 2021, even though they hold only 3 percent of the world’s vehicles.
Last month, the Nigerian government introduced a mobile app designed to prevent road accidents in the country. At least two deadly road accidents with dozens of deaths have occurred since.
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