But for the timely intervention of a team of policemen from Ode-Omu Division, two students of the Osun State Polytechnic, Iree would have been burnt to ashes by an angry mob in the Ode-Omu community of the state.
The undergraduates were set on fire by some irked residents of the community after their car crushed four persons to death on the road at the weekend.
The car, in which one of the students drove, reportedly rammed into a motorcycle, killing the motorcyclist and a family of three instantly on Saturday morning.
According to a witness, the motorcycle was conveying a woman simply identified as Cecilia and her three children to Oogi town after a vigil when the incident happened around Obada market, Ode-Omu.
The witness said the motorcyclist, the mother and two of her children died instantly with only the youngest child surviving.
Angered by the incident, some residents who saw what happened chased after the occupants of the car who tried to run away and caught two of them while one person reportedly escaped.
The residents reportedly set those caught on fire but they were said to have been rescued by the police.
Confirming the incident, the Police Public Relations Officer in the state, Yemisi Opalola, said police officers were able to rescue those set on fire on time.
She added that normalcy has returned to the area with those lynched taken to a hospital in Osogbo.
She said, “There was a fatal accident involving a motor and motorcycle in Obada road, Odeomu. The burnt vehicle registration number is BDG 481 JD (Lagos)
“The driver escaped immediately when the accident happened. After much appealing to the angry mob, they set ablaze the remaining two occupants of the vehicle.
“The police were able to quench the fire, rescue the occupants and transfer them to hospital in Osogbo. Normalcy has returned to the area.”
Meanwhile, the management of Osun State Polytechnic Iree has decried the jungle justice meted out on its students, describing it as barbaric and crude.
The Public Relations Officer of the institution, Tope Abiola, said the right thing for the community to have done was to take the survivors to the hospital and those who drove the car to the police instead of taking laws into their hands.
He threatened that the school would sue the traditional ruler of the community for allowing such jungle justice to happen in its domain, alleging that Ode-Omu community is notorious for meting out jungle justice on people, especially accident survivors.
