The representative of the insurance company handling Dana Airline, Lloyds Underwriters, London, Otunba Yomi Oshikoya, has said families of each of the victims of the ill-fated airplane, a McDonnell Douglas 83 (MD-83), will be paid $100,000 or N15.58 million, at Wednesday’s exchange rate of N155.84 to the US dollar.
He said the payment of compensation would commence within 30 days and assured Nigerians that the Airline would not cheat any beneficiary.
The aircraft crashed into a two-storey building at Iju-Ishaga, Lagos State, killing all 153 passengers on board.
Speaking during a press conference at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH) in Ikeja Wednesday, Oshikoya said the relatives would not be
treated below the international standard as enshrined in the company’s policy.
The International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) stipulates that each family of victims (passengers) of an air disaster is to be paid $100,000 (N15.58m), that of cabin crew members, $150,000 (N23.4m), while each family of pilots will receive $250,000 (about N38.96m).
He further said the initial sum of $30,000 would be paid within 30 days, adding that the balance of $70,000 would follow thereafter.
“By international standards, you are required to pay the sum of $30,000 to the victims as initial payment. By law, the substantive amount is $100,000 and I want to assure you that Lloyds will approach this as per international standard,” he said.
On the ground claims, he said the underwriters had contacted a surveyor in Nigeria to visit the site and evaluate the building and make a comprehensible report available to it.
“It is on the basis of the evaluation that compensation would be worked out,” he added.
Also at the event, Lagos State Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, Mr. Ade Ipaye, said that 52 identifiable bodies were recovered at the site of the crash and deposited at the mortuary of LASUTH.
The attorney-general, who further said that in all, 149 bodies were recovered, also disclosed that of this, 97 charred remains were taken to the Mainland Hospital mortuary.
He therefore appealed to the families of the deceased to bear with the state government during the process of trying to identify the bodies of their relatives.
He also said that government had applied to embassies and high commissions to provide pre-mortem information in respect of foreign nationals who died in the crash.
“We do not want the families of the deceased to suffer additional hardship. Letters would be sent to individual relatives of the deceased,” he added.
According to him, insurance is a matter that is global which laws are applicable in Nigeria, adding that the company, Lloyd, would ensure that the payment was made speedily so that the families of the victims would not suffer.
Ipaye said already, Lagos pathologists led by Prof. John Obafunwa, who doubles as the Vice-Chancellor of the Lagos State University (LASU), is leading five others and currently performing autopsy on the bodies, noting that they carried out 12 autopsies on Tuesday and had completed 18 Wednesday.
He reiterated that the autopsy is a very important procedure that must be performed for the benefit of the families of the victims for future reference, because they have to be issued certificates of death, stressing that the government had ordered the embassies to forward the profiles of the foreigners on board the crashed aircraft.
Meanwhile, Obafunwa Wednesday said the donors of DNA sample would be paired into groups of four to fast track the identification of the 29 corpses at the mortuary of LASUTH.
From the list reeled out by a Medical Social Services Department (MSSD) official who was identified as Biodun Ogurinde, THISDAY gathered that the whole DNA process would begin today by 8am and end tomorrow at about 6pm and would last an hour for each group.
Contrary to reports that blood samples would be taken for the DNA test, Obafunwa said the only sample needed would be the saliva of the donors which would be collected via cotton wool swabs.
On the expected time frame for the results, Obafunwa however could not put a definite date for its release, adding that it might take up to two or three weeks.
He said: “For now, we are tentative about the date the DNA result would come out but we are looking at two to three weeks interval. The process usually takes longer but due to the delicacy of this case, we will try and fast track the results.”
The professor made this disclosure Wednesday evening while addressing relatives of the victims of the deceased who were already agitated at the failure to carry out the DNA as promised.
Obafunwa had promised to commence the DNA at about 10am yesterday, urging the relatives to come in with the biological families of the deceased to make the matching process easier.
However, as at evening, the DNA process was yet to start despite the regular enquiries by the relatives of the deceased to the officials of the MSSD, one of the departments charged to ensure free flow of information.
Debunking claims that the DNA would not be carried out on all the identified corpses, Obafunwa said exempting any corpse might backfire later as a mix up might occur.
However, THISDAY gathered that the DNA would not have been carried out on all the corpses but for the mild drama that ensued in the morning when two different families claimed the same corpse of a baby girl as theirs.
Eyewitness accounts disclosed that during the identification process, one of the families had earlier identified the corpse of a little girl as their own but no sooner had they done that than another family insisted that the same corpse was theirs.
An MSSD official said they maintained their position to carry out DNA tests on all the corpses to prevent anyone coming back to sue the hospital for negligence.
News credit: Thisday
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