HE SPENT 13 hours trapped under the rubble of the collapsed Nigerian Synagogue Church of All Nations (Scoan) hostel and says he owes his survival, without even one bruise to show, to a miracle from God.
Speaking to CV in the safety of his home in Tshirolwe village in Vhembe, Khathutshelo Ramovha (28) is one of the survivors of a tragedy that claimed at least 115 lives on September 12.
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“It was terrible. No one could breathe properly. Some people were crying, ‘my legs, my eyes, my hands’ and there was no help for them.
“I saw people die right before my eyes,” he described his ordeal.
Ramovha was part of a South African group of 25 people who were accommodated in a seven-story hostel with other groups. He said on the day that the building collapsed, about 350 people including himself returned to the hostel for lunch on the ground floor after attending a lecture.
“As I started to eat, I heard a noise coming from the walls. There was no time to think or do anything.
“The building collapsed on top of us. There was no way to escape.
“A few other people and I were unscathed because the rubble had formed a small cave where we were.
“It was like being in a cave that I could not stand up in,” he recalled.
He said it took the rescue team 10 hours to remove the rubble and cut through reinforcement beams.
“They made a sort of tunnel and we had to crawl to them.
“I was the fifth person to see the sky after 13 hours,” he described his rescue.
Ramovha said he was taken to hospital by ambulance and discharged the following day.
He lost everything he had with him in the disaster, including his Ipad, clothes and ID.
“It is God’s mercy that I survived. My survival is also a testimony my calling.
“When God called me, he said ‘go out, stage a crusade and preach the gospel so that people will repent from their sins’,” Ramovha said.
He said he would still visit Scoan if there was a need, but his parents did not want him to do so.
He explained how he met with some of the church leaders by invitation at their offices in Gauteng two weeks ago. “They told me they would visit my family here at home and I am happy about that,” he said.
The Limpopo premier’s spokesperson, Kenny Mathivha, said eight of the South African victims of the church collapse were from Limpopo.
“Four of the eight people survived and returned home, while one person is still in hospital,” he said.
“Support for the victim’s families is coordinated through the social develop-ment department and they have dispatched teams to assist the families,” he said.
Spokesperson for Scoan in South Africa, Kirsten Nematandani, said a church delegation had visited bereaved families, four of them in the Vhembe area.
“We don’t just visit them, we also help to meet their needs.
“If the deceased was a breadwinner and there are still children who are attending school, we help them so that they can continue going to school,” he said, adding that all the families they had visited so far had welcomed them.
