THIS is one of the saddest moments in the annals of this country’s history. So many lives lost while in search of spiritual fulfilment on a pilgrimage to Lagos. The deaths of the dozens of South African pilgrims in Nigeria will take some time to sink in.
President Jacob Zuma put it in perspective when he reminded a stunned nation on Tuesday evening that never “in the recent history of our country have we had this large number of our people die in one incident outside the country”.
Perhaps the last single incident in which such a huge number of our compatriots died outside our borders was when the Helderberg plunged into the Indian Ocean east of Mauritius on November 28, 1987 in a crash that still remains a mystery. All 159 passengers and crew perished.
For families and ordinary South Africans, the cause of the collapse of the Synagogue Church of All Nations building outside the Nigerian commercial capital of Lagos is still a matter for conjecture.
The sprawling campus of televangelist TB Joshua’s synagogue draws pilgrims from many countries seeking divine intervention for incurable diseases.
Some of his devotees believe he can raise the dead from the grave.
Joshua has published a video purporting to show a mysterious aircraft flying low over the building four times before the disaster.
He told a televised service on Sunday that his church had been targeted before by Nigeria’s Boko Haram extremists.
However, the evangelist’s attempt to shift blame to others rings hollow. Non-compliance with proper building regulations is closer to the truth – the wing collapsed while three extra storeys were being added to the two existing floors, with no additional reinforcement to support the extra weight.
For now, we grieve with the families of those whose deaths have been confirmed. An unknown number of other South Africans who were on this doomed pilgrimage are still unaccounted for, so the country can expect more bad tidings as teams dig through the rubble.
Nigeria and South Africa stand united in grief.