Corpses re-buried at homes to make way for road works

Mr E.V.K. Ogah, Volta Regional Registration officer of births and deaths, has advised chiefs along the Kpando-Dambai and Jasikan-Nkwanta roads to allocate new and suitable areas for cemeteries and discourage their people from exhuming and reburying corpses in their homes.

Mr Ogah said as a result of the road constructions going on in the area, the people are exhuming bodies of their relations for burial in their homes. In a statement to the press in Ho at the weekend, Mr Ogah said such practices are against the registration of births and deaths law (act 301).

He said the act states in section 24 that "it shall not be lawful to bury a dead body elsewhere than a burial ground authorised under this part, except with the permission of the local authority." It states that "subject to the provisions of the coroners act of 1960 (act 18) no person shall exhume or after burial remove any corpse except under sub-section one of this section." Mr Ogah said the practice is, therefore, unlawful and a health risk for which offenders are liable to prosecution.