Michael Adeniran, the father of a 12-year-old Chrisland International School student, Opebi branch, has taken to social media to cry out over the death of his daughter, Whitney Adeniran, who allegedly died during the school’s inter-house sports activities.
According to posts making the rounds on social media on Saturday night, Adeniran said his daughter died on Thursday at the Agege Stadium, where the school used for its sporting activities.
According to him, the child had no health condition or sickness as at when the school bus picked her up for the event
Adeniran, who also said that there was no explanation given to himself and his wife from the school, added that his wife was present at the stadium, but the school did not call her attention to the incident immediately.
He has subsequently called on the Lagos State Government and the police to look into the matter and get justice for his slain child.
Adeniran wrote, “To the biggest shock of my life by 1 pm in the afternoon, I got a call from my wife that she was informed that our daughter slumped at the inter-house sport and she was rushed to the clinic.
“My wife was at the venue even before the event started. She was never informed or called until they have conveyed our child out of the venue before they informed her. On arrival of my wife at the health center where they took my daughter. my daughter was lying dead with her lips black and her tongue black.
“My wife called me urgently, I left my office to the place and found my 12year old daughter lying dead on the ground. I asked questions about what happened to my daughter and the school authority could not get me any information as to what happened to my child in their care.
“I gave Chrisland school a healthy vibrant young girl what Chrisland returned to me is a dead child. My entire family is in deep sorrow but the school Authority claimed they know nothing about my daughter’s death and all they know is that my daughter slumped and died.”
Adeniran further said the school had no ambulance or paramedics at the event, except for a nurse he described as a “quack,” who he said later confessed that the child died at the stadium
He added that, “My question is what happened to my daughter at Agege stadium? As a father, I demand answers from Chrisland International High School. I am in deep pain and sorrow right now. If you are a father you will understand my pain. My daughter is highly loved by us. We cherished her existence and we can never allow an institution to gloss over the death of our daughter.
“Since we started asking this question. The school has been asking us to back down from the autopsy and I know they know their way into the system. I am calling on the pathology department of @lasuth to please be honest with their result. Lagos State government, Nigerian Government, please intervene.”
Meanwhile, Mrs Blessing Adeniran, the mother of the 12-year-old Chrisland International School student, Opebi branch, who allegedly died during the school’s inter-house sports activities at Agege Stadium, has taken to social media to narrate how she found out her daughter, Whitney Adeniran, had died.
In the video on her Instagram page on Sunday, the tearful mother said that she was told her daughter slumped and had been rushed to the hospital.
Blessing said she immediately rushed to the hospital but had a hard time finding it because she was given the wrong address.
However after she finally located where her daughter was, she said Whitney was already dead and her lips and tongue were black.
Narrating her ordeal, she said, “We drove out of the stadium to the gate, we asked the gatemen (for the hospital), they didn’t know. As we were driving around we were asking people where we can find Central Hospital but they all said they only knew Agege General Hospital. When we couldn’t locate the place we decided to go to Agege Central Mosque and on our way to the mosque, we saw the school bus packed, so we knew we were at the place.
“I jumped down from the car when we saw the school bus and rushed in. I saw the staff that went with her (Whitney) and I asked her ‘Madam where is my child, what happened, why did she faint’ she (the staff) said ‘I don’t know, she’s in there’. I went in there and I saw my daughter’s corpse, Desola didn’t say anything to me. I went in there and I met my daughter on her deathbed, she was already dead.
“She was drenched, soaked to the skin, water was dripping. I knelt down, I called on God, I shouted, I screamed. I felt her pulse, there was no pulse. My daughter was silent. I asked the doctor what happened to my daughter and he said from the look of things she suffered from cardiac arrest.”
Continuing, she said, “How does a 12-year-old have a cardiac arrest? No pre-existing heart condition, no pre-existing medical condition. She was hale and hearty, she was not sick in any form. Even if she will die from cardiac arrest why should one arrest kill a healthy teenager? Let me state this, that by the time I got there, my daughter’s lips and tongue had already turned black.”
Blessing also revealed that her daughter was not taken to a hospital but an immunisation centre, adding that there was no proper first aid management.
She said, “My child was not taken to a hospital, she was taken to an immunisation centre but that is not even my pain. My pain is there was no proper first aid management, there was nothing that was done for her; she was brought to the hospital dead.
“Because when her medical report came in, it said dead on arrival. When my husband came he came in to pick his child to take her to another hospital, he came in and met her dead. He screamed, shouted, ‘Desola, daddy is here, stand up. What is happening to my child’. My husband knelt down crying begging the doctor ‘help me, this is my first child’.”
So also, the management of Chrisland schools has explained the incident that led to the death of one of their students, Whitney Adeniran, who died during the school’s inter-house sports activities at Agege Stadium, Lagos State, on Thursday.
Meanwhile, the Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer, Benjamin Hundeyin, confirmed the incident saying, “the matter was reported to the police immediately after the incident occurred.
“The case is presently at the State Criminal Investigation Department and an autopsy is going to be carried out to know the circumstances that led to her death. That’s all the update I have for now.”
Reacting to the call for justice for the deceased, Chrisland released a press statement on Sunday and a copy was made available to our correspondent.
The statement read, “The management and staff of Chrisland Schools Limited, with a deep sense of loss, announce the death of our precious student, Whitney Adeniran; whose painful exit occurred on Thursday, February 9th, 2023.
“We are heartbroken and distressed. Whitney was one of our Day students who opted not to participate in the inter-house sports match past for reasons we were not very sure of.
“However, on discretion, we respected her decision to err on the side of caution, because on the January 20, 2023, it is in our records that she had complained about a not-too-buoyant health and we immediately contacted her parents.
“Her father, Mr. Michael Adeniran, came to the school to take her home. We emphasised to her parents to take a critical look at her.”
The school said the deceased slumped in “public view and not under any hidden circumstances,” adding that she was rushed to the nearest medical facility for first aid.
“Our immediate response was to take advantage of proximity to first-aid, by identifying the nearest medical facility to take her to, where the doctor on duty, administered oxygen and every aid possible on her,” the statement said.
Chrisland appealed to the Adeniran family to establish a scientific verification of the underlying cause of her death before her burial.
“We immediately notified regulatory stakeholders and agencies to allow for a comprehensive evaluation and assessment of the developments.
“In spite of the compelling imperatives to fill any information gaps in public space, we stopped short of making any media sensation out of this, because the deceased in question, was a minor and is deserving of our unqualified respect.
“We also prioritised according respect to the privacy of the family and were with them consistently, to mourn together. This is a painful loss for all of us,” it added.
While mourning Whitney Adeniran, the management and staff of the Lagos-based school said they feel the deep pain of this loss and their thoughts and prayers are with the family.
“As we continue to uphold the sobriety of this moment, we resist any urge to join issues on her treasured memory, in media trends.
“As we await the outcome of an independent post-mortem process, we remain unwaveringly committed to supporting the family at this critical moment and pray fervently for the fortitude to bear her painful loss,” the statement added.
