10 Killed On Kumasi Highway

Ten persons died in three accidents in the Ashanti Region at the weekend. Two occurred on the Konongo stretch of the Kumasi-Accra highway, in which eight persons died instantly and 20 seriously injured.

The third accident, in which two persons died, occurred yesterday when the vehicle they were travelling on drove into a ditch after having a flat tyre while at Tweapease, a farming community in the Ahafo Ano South District.

The deceased in the third accident, a male and a female, died instantly when their Toyota Prado with registration number AS 4961-10, driven by the founder and leader of the Last Point Ministry at Techimantia in the Brong Ahafo region, got involved in the accident.

The first crash, involving a Cosmos bus belonging to the Ghana Baptist University College (GBUC), Abuakwa campus in Kumasi, reportedly killed three students and a pastor of the university on the sport and injured 12 other persons, at about 5:30am. Almost all the deceased, according to reports, had their hands chopped off as their side of the vehicle hit a truck with registration number GT1430 J loaded with teak.

The school bus with registration number AS903-10, which was carrying students from Kumasi to Tema to attend a wedding ceremony, was allegedly moving at top speed and on reaching the Yaw Kwei portion of the road, it run into a stationary Man diesel articulated truck which was parked at the shoulder of the highway.

According to reports, just three hours after the deceased and injured persons had been conveyed to the hospital, a Mitsubishi L300 Mini Urvan bush with registration number GW4385 Q, also ran into another faulty articulated truck at about 9am.

Daily Guide learnt, when it got to the scene at about 1:30pm, that some of the injured persons were rushed to the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital (KATH) in Kumasi and others to Konongo Government Hospital. Both drivers, Kwame Adjei-Mensah, in-charge of the Cosmos bus and Kwame Menash, who was driving the Mitsubishi Urvan bus, survived the accidents and have since been arrested.

ASP Augustine Mensah, Commander of the Motor Traffic and Transport Unit (MTTU) at Konongo said the names of the deceased and the injured persons could not be immediately ascertained.

According to ASP Mensah, the MAN diesel truck developed a fault when it got to that portion of the road and the driver irresponsibly parked virtually in the middle of the lane on Friday evening without informing the police.

He said at about 5:30am on Saturday, information reached the police that the school bus had ran into the truck, killing four of its occupants and injuring 12 others. The police commander told Daily Guide that soon after they had begin conveying the bodies of the deceased and injured persons to the hospital and towing the vehicles to safe places, reports of the second accident reached them. Grieving over the spate of vehicular crashes on the Kumasi Accra road, the Konongo MTTU commander said nearly 95 percent of accidents were man-made.

According to an eyewitness account to the Ahafo Ano accident, Pastor Sampson Okyere was travelling from his Techimantia base when his vehicle had a flat tyre, resulting in the vehicle somersaulting three times before landing in a ditch.

The eyewitness told Daily Guide that the pastor, who was dressed in suit, tried as much as possible to control the vehicle when the unfortunate development occurred but was not successful as the vehicle finally landed in the ditch. An elder of the pastor’s church and a woman who pleaded with the pastor to give her a lift to Kumasi died on the spot when the accident occurred.

Fortunately, the pastor, who was travelling with his family including a four-month-old baby, escaped unhurt in the accident which occurred at about 10:30am yesterday morning. However, two other occupants of the vehicle sustained varying degrees of injuries and were rushed to the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital for medical attention.

The baby who, was found under one of the seats of the vehicle, was healthy, in spite of the severity of the accident.

Meanwhile, the Inspector General of Police has directed that commanders should arrange to have broken down vehicles towed from the roads.

The directive, which was handed down through the Commander of the Motor Traffic and Transport Unit (MTTU) of the Ghana police Service, ACP Awuni Angwubutoge added that vehicles which were not broken down were also to be toward away and the drivers dragged to court.

The MTTU Commander, who broke the news about the fatal accident, sounded disturbed about the rate of accidents in the country. He is scheduled to meet with the association of towing vehicle operators to solicit their support towards the new directive from the IGP.