Date: 2017-10-31

It was a near death experience for the Caretaker Committee Chairman of the Kwara State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Chief Tunde Akindehin, his Secretary, Sadiq Dan Seko and some reporters as they were trapped in the elevator of Kwara Hotel on Saturday.

The incident which occurred around 4pm lasted for about 15 minutes before the hurried intervention of officials of the hotel who came to rescue the victims.

Trouble started when the elevator the chairman and others entered refused to open on getting to the fifth floor.

All efforts from the trapped victims to remedy the situation proved abortive thereby leading to a terrifying situation.

Out of fear and uncertainly, several phone calls were made to the reception desk by the victims before some officials of the facility were deployed to repair the faulty elevator to rescue the occupants.

A furious Akindehin as soon as the elevator returned to the ground floor accused officials of the hotel who had gathered with worried faces of not paying premium attention to safety of customers.

"You better fix this elevator and stop people from using it before it leads to a terrible situation. This was a near death experience for all of us and we thank God that we have been rescued. I have had such experience in other places and know the danger it portends.

"A little bit longer inside the elevator, the air condition will stop working and that is when it will dawn on us the reality of the whole scenario," Akindehin added.

For other occupants, they described the elevator 'a moving coffin'. Apologies by the officials of the facility over the indecent attracted sharp responses from the victims.

Those affected abandoned the elevator by climbing the staircase to the fifth floor.

It was gathered that Saturday's incident was the second time in two days the elevator will develop fault midway leaving occupants trapped for some minutes.

When contacted last night, the Head of Corporate Affairs, Harmony Holdings Limited, Kayode Aremu, said he was not aware of any such occurrence but promised to get back to this reporter.

"I wouldn't know but let me find out and get back to you," Aremu said. He however did not get back to this medium before this paper went to bed.