Majidun ferry mishap: The LASWA story, by agency’s boss

Culled from the Vangaurd..
      There are controversies surrounding the boat mishap that occurred on the second day of this month which left eight people dead, while 12 others were rescued after a wooden boat capsized in Majidun area of Ikorodu.
The Lagos State Waterways Authority, LASWA, the agency saddled with the responsibility of sanitizing travels on the state’s waterways believes some reports on the accident were not only uninformed but also mischievous.

The Agency’s Managing Director, Olayinka Marinho, gave his organization side of the story in an interview with LEKE ADESERI, the South West Regional Editor.
ON  the Majidun mishap that claimed eight lives
On that fateful day, 22 passengers embarked on the journey at about 5:30am and were all putting on life jackets from Ebute Ero. The accident happened along Oworoshoki channel heading towards Majidun.
We got a distress call around 5:50am and got to the accident scene at 6:10am and with the management of Bell Marine, the ferry owners,  because the boat that hit the log called other boats from his company who came to assist. We were able to save 14 persons, though we eventually lost eight persons.
With the help of LASAMBUS, we moved the victims to General Hospital Ikorodu. The corpses were later moved to morgue of  High land hospital the following day. Our agency and Bell marine management took possession of the corpses  we recovered and handed them over to Marine police, Ikoyi where the case was reported.
After this, we went back to that same channel to bring out the boat in order to investigate the cause of the accident and we discovered the hole on the boat and we also discovered all the logs around the channel which caused the boat to sink.
At that point in time, we had been able to go round to most of the victims who survived to clarify some issues to help our investigation.
After the incident, we  invited the loggers association to discuss how we will ensure that such mishap do not occur again.
We have taken it upon ourselves to monitor those logs from the entry point of Epe to Makoko. We had an agreement with the loggers Association in 2012 and we are going back to that agreement to ensure their logs do not become hindrance to the movement of our boats and passengers along the water ways.
As regards the search and rescue, LASWA with the management of Bell marine saved 14 survivors. LASWA divers brought out six dead bodies from the boat that sank underneath the lagoon and retrieved the boat from the lagoon.

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