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7 more bodies retrieved from Volta Lake accident

Seven more bodies have been retrieved from the Volta Lake, following last Thursday’s boat disaster on the lake in the Afram Plains North District of the Eastern Region.

This brings to a total of eight bodies retrieved so far, after a 60-year-old woman was found earlier on.

Speaking in a telephone conversation with the Ghanaian Times, the National Disaster Management Organization (NADMO) Coordinator, Mr David Nyarko said as of 8:00 p.m. on Saturday, seven more bodies had been retrieved from last Thursday’s boat disaster on the Volta Lake in the Afram Plains area of the Eastern Region.

They include the boat operator, six females including one pregnant woman and a little girl.

The assembly man for Anidzi electoral area, Raphael Kporxah said apart from the 60-year-old woman whose body was retrieved last Friday and deposited at the Donkorkrom Presbyterian Church Hospital, all the other seven bodies retrieved had since been identified and buried by their families because the bodies had started decomposing.

He said they were retrieved from the lake through a combined effort of local fishermen, divers and NADMO officials in the area, in the company of the District Chief Executive (DCE) of the Kwahu North District, Mr Samuel Kena.

He said the boat operator, believed to be between 20 and 25 years and the small girl were both buried at Agalakope, a nearby community where the bodies were found decomposing.

The disaster occurred on the Volta Lake last Thursday when a boat carrying an unspecified number of passengers capsized.

One body was recovered on Friday, while emergency teams, including local divers continued the search for the remaining passengers.

The boat, which was carrying mostly traders from Dzemeni in the Volta Region, was heading to Sokpe Agalekope in the Afram Plains North District of the Eastern Region when it capsized midway through the journey near Anivizi, a village along the Volta Lake.

Earlier reports said the sad incident occurred at about 5:00 pm last Thursday when the outboard motor powering the boat stopped functioning in the middle of the lake amidst a heavy rainstorm.

From: Ama Tekyiwaa Ampadu Agyeman & David Kodjo, Donkorkrom.

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