How 16 passengers from one family died in Lagos boat mishap

By Steve Agbota

The Ovori of Ibeshe, Oba Alani Gausu, on Wednesday blamed lack of training and human error from boat operators for the death of 16 boat passengers who are from the Sumola Aniajogun family of Ibeshe in Mile2 area of Lagos recently. 

This is even as the National Inland Waterways Authority (NIWA) revealed that the jetty where the ill-fated boat departed last Friday had been closed down since last year June. The Authority also arrested seven people in an open boat without wearing life jacket, who claimed to be boat drivers.

Speaking when a delegation from the Lagos Area office of the NIWA visited him in his palace yesterday, Oba Alani Gausu, urged the regulators to carry out more training for boat skippers to ensure such avoidable incidents are not repeated.

“The boat tragedy that resulted in the death of 17 boat passengers last Friday was due to human error. The boat driver failed to do what he ought to have done before loading passengers on the boat and pushing the boat into water. How can a boat driver load passengers on a boat, push the boat into the water before checking if he had the correct mixture of engine oil in the boat engine? 

“Due to this error from the boat driver, the tide pushed the fully loaded boat underneath a barge and the entire passengers, including the boat driver drowned. It all boils down to lack of training for boat drivers. Many of them are not educated. Many of them operate under the influence of drugs. It is important that NIWA, Lagos State Waterways Authority (LASWA), and other stakeholders provide training for boat skippers,” he added. 

He noted that if boat skippers are well trained, the scenario where drivers operate outside the 6:30am to 6:30pm stipulated time won’t occur, adding that the ill-fated boat that sank was carrying passengers beyond it’s capacity. 

“The boat was overloaded and was operating outside the time for safe navigation.We need more training for boat drivers to ensure incidences like this does not repeat itself,” he said.

Condoling with the Ibeshe monarch, the Lagos Area Manager of NIWA, Sarat Braimah assured the monarch of increased patrol of the waterways to forestall future occurrence of such incidences.

 “We are here to condole with you over the death of 16 members of the Ibeshe community in a boat mishaps in mile 2 area of Lagos. I bring you words of condolences from my Managing Director, Dr. George Moghalu over the boat mishaps that occured in Mile 2. Kindly accept our deepest condolences over the lives lost in the mishap.