Seven people, reportedly university undergraduates, died after inhaling fumes from a generator inside a music studio on Transformer Road, Ebis, in the Amarata area of Yenagoa, the capital of Bayelsa State.
The victims, whose identities are yet to be confirmed, were working at a recording studio owned by one of them, Akpos Barakubo, when the incident occurred on Tuesday morning.
According to reports, the majority of the fatalities were young people, some of whom were already married.
Residents of Ebis reported that the studio crew worked late into the night with generators due to the state’s poor power supply.
It was gathered that the victims fell asleep with the generator running inside the studio and forgot to switch it off before dozing off.
The report stated that six bodies were discovered on Tuesday morning, while one individual, found unconscious and rushed to the hospital, later passed away.
It was also revealed that most of the deceased were undergraduates from the state-owned Niger Delta University (NDU) in Amassoma, who were involved in the recording business to support their education.
At the time of the report, security operatives had cordoned off the area.
The victims’ bodies were said to have been evacuated and taken to a morgue in Yenagoa by police officials.
A resident of the area, Damion Asamonye, blamed the state and federal governments as well as the Port Harcourt Distribution Company (PHED) for the deaths of the seven individuals.
He lamented that if there had been an adequate power supply, they would not have needed to use a generator throughout the night, which led to their fatal inhalation of carbon monoxide.
Asamonye criticized the unreliable power situation in the state, noting that the distribution company only provides electricity when it is time to collect bills and then disconnects the power shortly after customers have paid for the month.
Asamonye said: “Both the federal and state governments have failed us; if there was a public power supply, maybe these people wouldn’t have lost their lives in this callous manner. It is sad and painful. Seven promising men just died like that because they were trying to eke out a living for themselves”.