Accidents Claim 11 Lives

A damaged vehicle at the spot of the accident.

A damaged vehicle at the spot of the accident.
Eleven persons were killed in separate accidents during the Easter festivities in the Eastern Region. On Monday, April 21, 2014, one Yaw Opoku, 25, was arrested by the Anyinam police for stealing a motorbike belonging to one of the deceased at Enyiresi.

Raphael Ofori, 24 and Alex Mreku, 38, were traveling on an unregistered motorbike from Koforidua to Kwahu to celebrate the Easter festivities on Good Friday when they got involved in an accident at Enyiresi at about 8:45 pm.

Police is investigating the cause of the accident.

According to information gathered, the two victims bled profusely at the scene of the accident, even though the Enyiresi hospital was in view and the victims could have been assisted by onlookers.

They were later rescued by the Deputy Regional Police Commander, ACP James Azuma Abass Abaah and his guards, but it was rather too late to save them.

According to the Regional MTTU Commander, Chief Supt. Samuel Tetteh, Raphael died on reaching the hospital while Mreku died later the same day.

The motorbike was however, not in sight, raising suspicion about what might have happened.

The following day the police, acting on a tip-off, arrested Yaw Opoku after they had found Mreku's unregistered motorbike in his room at Enyiresi.

He is in custody helping police with investigations.

In another development, on Easter Sunday at about 9:20 pm, Akoraga Amoah, 34, was riding a motorbike from Nsawam to Addoagyiri with one Abi Adwoa, 31, at the pillion when they were knocked down by an unidentified vehicle.

Both of them died instantly. Their remains have been deposited at the morgue of the Nsawam Government Hospital.

Then again at about 12:45 pm, a rider called Richard Sackey, 40, was riding from Kwahu-Mpraeso towards Kwahu-Nkwatia with his wife, Grace Sackey, also 40, together with their son, Elijah Sackey, 10, when their motorbike rammed into a vehicle on the opposite direction.

The woman died on the spot while her husband and the son are in critical condition at the Atibie Government Hospital where they are receiving treatment.

On Holy Saturday, Amos Kofi, a, 86-year-old man, was hit and killed by a hit-and-run driver while on the way back from church at New Afutu, off the Nsawam bypass.

His body has been deposited at the Nsawam Government Hospital.

Earlier on Good Friday, at about 12:45 pm an unregistered Toyota Corolla rammed into a number of pedestrians at Kukurantumi, in the Eastern Region, killing three persons instantly, while one person died later at the Regional Hospital at Koforidua.

The deceased were Alfred Afam, 13; Elizabeth Frimpongmaa, 51; Adormu Christian, 14 and Afia Esther.

On Holy Thursday, an unidentified man, aged about 24, was also killed in a fatal accident at about 9:30 pm after a KIA Rio taxi cab he had boarded made a U-turn at the ECOWAS point, Nkawkaw, and ran into a Daewoo Tico cab.

His body has since been deposited at the Holy Family Hospital at Nkawkaw awaiting autopsy.

From Rocklyn Antonio, Enyiresi