A rider of popular commercial tricycle, popularly known as ‘Keke Napep’ in Nigeria, and his four passengers have been crushed to death in Bayelsa State.

The five were crushed to death by a tipper driver along the Tombia-Amassoma Road in Yenagoa, the state capital.

The incident happened on Monday.

WuzupNigeria gathered that the tricycle and the tipper collided around 7:30 pm near the first bridge before the Dust Bin Bus Stop near a cooking gas plant under construction.

A sand dealer in the area, Tobis Diseye, said the tipper driver was trying to manoeuvre away from a heap of chippings on his lane when he ran over the tricycle operator and his passengers on the opposite lane.

They died on the spot.

The bodies of the victims had been deposited in the mortuary of a hospital in Yenagoa.

Angered by the incident, the tricycle operators under the auspices of Tombia Along Keke Unit, on Tuesday morning, protested the killing of their member by the tipper driver.

They blocked a section of the Tombia-Amassoma Road and stopped other operators from plying the road during the action.

A former chairman of TAKU, Henry Mbu, said in an interview that hey were saddened by the incident.

Mbu, who stated that his successor died two weeks ago, said,

“We are not happy. We are not happy. After the day’s work, yesterday, in the evening (of Monday), we saw one of our drivers and four passengers dead.

“Their bodies were scattered. If you saw the dead bodies, you would pity them. It was a tipper driver that caused the accident yesterday.

“We are doing this protest to tell the whole world that we are not happy about the killing of our member and his passengers by the tipper driver.”

A member of the TAKU, Uzoma Onyeka, called for the prosecution of the owner of the gas plant, saying the heap of chippings dumped on the road was the major cause of the accident.

Another tricycle operator, Ipalibo Anabrabah, called on the government to regulate the activities of tipper drivers and the owners of tippers in the state.

“Let them not drive in the night. Even though they want to drive in the day time, there should be a limit to the speed they will apply. The roads are not wide. They should not drive on speed because other small vehicles are also moving on the roads,”he said.