AfriqueCAN
OVER 40 people are presumed to have died after a boat overloaded with passengers sank on a river in Zamfara at the weekend www.AfriqueCAN.com
Authorities said the vessel was ferrying 53 farmers to their farms across the Gummi on Saturday when it capsized.
“Only 12 were rescued yesterday shortly after the accident,” said Na’Allah Musa, a political administrator of the flood-hit Gummi district where the accident happened.
Musa added that authorities were searching for the bodies of the rest of the passengers, who are presumed to have died.
He also said that the vessel was “crammed with passengers far beyond its capacity which caused it to overturn and sink.”
In a statement on Sunday, President Bola Tinubu “expressed the government and the people of Nigeria’s commiseration” for the “twin tragedies” of the farmers’ deaths and the nearby floods.
