I thank God Tolulope achieved her dreams before she died – Father

Engineer Akintude Arotile is the father of the late first female combatant pilot in Nigeria, Miss Tolulope Arotile, who passed away in a road accident on Tuesday in Kaduna. Mr. Arotile, who retired from the Transition Company of Nigeria (TCN) last year as a power engineer, spoke with OYIBO SALIHU at his GRA residence in Lokoja, the Kogi state capital, on the death of his daughter.

You must have been devastated by the loss of you daughter?

Devastation is an understatement. From day one she had been a brilliant and wonderful daughter to the family. She schooled in Kaduna from kindergarten to nursery at the Air Force Base and later the Nigeria Defence Academy, Kaduna.

One day when she was very small, she pointed to one small aircraft parked on the field and said, dad, one day I am going to fly that aircraft and I said ‘Amen.’

So, from that day, she started working towards that. She got admission to the Nigerian Defence Academy, Kaduna; she obtained a Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics, and became an Air Force Cadet.

She was sent on several courses abroad and became a pilot. I just thank God that she was able to achieve her dreams as a baby before this sudden death.

What was her childhood like?

Oh God!  Tolulope is number four among the children God almighty blessed me with. Right from day one she had been very intelligent. Sometimes, I wonder what type of IQ God gave to her. She also combined intelligence with hard work which propelled her to achieve her dream of becoming a pilot.

In fact, if you had been here when her bosses from Enugu came, you would think she was their daughter – the way they were eulogising her and being proud of her achievements.

When was your last encounter with her?

The very day she died, at about 1:00pm. I called her because she just came back from an operation against the bandits in Katsina. They gave them one week to rest and so she was sleeping and told me she was resting. She said she would later go out to make some photocopies and I told her not to be long and to return home in time because she was staying with my first daughter in Kaduna.

But around 5.30 pm that same day, somebody called me and asked if I had called her today and I said yes. Then the person told me to call her which I did, but no response; so, I called her colleagues, and they were all crying on phone.

I asked what happened, but they were just crying. So, I called one of her bosses who told me that her body was in the mortuary.

I said that how can that happened? Somebody I spoke with just four hours ago and by 5:00pm she was in the mortuary. I had to drive to Lokoja from Abuja to enable me to inform her mother physically, because I could not break such sad and devastating news to her on phone.

But when I arrived in Lokoja and went home straight, my wife, the mother of my daughter, had gone to the prayer mountain.

She came back around 8.30pm and I told her what I heard, but that I had not confirmed it.

What have been the reactions of the Air Force authorities since the incident happened?

I must say that I am really impressed by the outpouring of sympathy and support. There have been several visits from her bosses from all over the country, including here in Lokoja, Abuja, Kaduna, Enugu, and everywhere.

The support have been overwhelming; they even gave a token and promised that later they would do something. They have even promised to give a choice of where to bury her, but her commandant suggested that she should be buried at the National Cemetery, Abuja, because of the number of people that would attend the funeral due her achievements as the first female combatant pilot in Nigeria.

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