Opinions of Saturday, 16 April 2022
Columnist: Akumbobe Robert
2022-04-16It's time for us to put in place safety measures to ensure our waterways are safe to travel on
File photo of an island
There is a report of the death of seven people after their boat capsized on the Volta late in the Kwahu North District of the Eastern region. In March 2022 there was another report of four boys drowning in the same Volta lake in Yeji, in the Pru East district of the Bono East region.
The memory of the students
Read full articleof St. Lwanga R/C junior high school who perished on the way from their teacher's farm is still fresh in our minds. This brings into question the safety of our water bodies. One will argue that these are normal accidents that occur just like the road accidents that we witness on a daily basis and that there is no cause for alarm. But, this goes beyond that, and innocent lives are being lost.
The safety of our water bodies leaves much to be desired. There are no checkpoints to ensure, for example, the nature of the boat and the number of people it is allowed to carry. There are always no safety vests for travelers to wear and the last thing is the tree shrubs on our water bodies.
There are factors that the boat owner can control and others where they have to leave their fate to God as they set off.
This is where the government comes in. There could be checkpoints to ensure that boats carry the prescribed number of passengers they are allowed to carry and that each passenger gets a safety vest to wear. There should be a law that no boat should be allowed to operate till it has a safety vest for each passenger it is supposed to carry.
The issue of tree shrubs in our water bodies can be resolved, and it will take only governmental invention to achieve this.
Many island communities depend on water travel as their only means of transport to get around. We must not allow them to do this each and every time, at the peril of their own lives.
Non-governmental organizations can also come to support this campaign and even help by providing logistics that will help to make water travel safe, especially for these island communities.
