Wednesday, 11th February, 2026
Hon Helen Adjoa Ntoso
Krachi West
Thank you, Mr Speaker, for giving me the opportunity to make this important Statement on a heartbreaking incident that occurred in my Constituency. This happened last year, but my Statement has now been admitted.
Mr Speaker, a tragic accident occurred on 11th October, 2025, on the Volta Lake at Okumah, an island community in the Krachi West Constituency, which claimed the lives of 16 individuals, including 11 children.
Mr Speaker, the boat which was carrying over 20 passengers travelling from Okumah to Debume to attend the funeral of a beloved one regrettably capsised. Preliminary reports suggest that overloading and poor safety measures may have contributed to this devastating tragedy. This heartbreaking event has left families and the entire community in deep mourning. Our hearts and prayers go out to the bereaved families and all those affected by this irreparable loss. The sole survivors of this tragic incident are a young lady and her baby; in a family of nine, she lost both her parents and all her siblings.
Mr Speaker, the Ghana Maritime Authority has since launched an investigation into the incident, while the Government has given some support to the affected families, including the payment of funeral expenses. The Vice President, Her Excellency Prof Naana Jane Opoku-Agyemang, has also visited the community to express her condolences and also donated life jackets and other relief items to the victims’ families and survivors.
The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Engineers and Planners, a Ghanaian businessman and philanthropist, Mr Ibrahim Mahama, in a prompt response, donated 200 life jackets when the incident occurred. My gratitude goes to them, not forgetting the Oti Regional Minister, the Director General of the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO), the Minister for Transport, staff of the Ghana Maritime Authority and all the security agencies for their prompt response.
Mr Speaker, this painful tragedy serves as yet another reminder of the urgent need to enforce strict safety standards on our waterways. We must ensure that boats are not overloaded, that operators are properly trained and licensed, and that every passenger wears a life jacket before boarding.
In this regard, Mr Speaker, I wish to once again make a passionate appeal to the Government, corporate organisations, benevolent individuals, and nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) to come to the aid of the people of Krachi West by donating more life jackets to our island communities and other settlements along the riverbanks, whose only means of transportation is by water. The supply we currently have is woefully inadequate. Many of my constituents rely on the Volta Lake for daily transportation, trade and access to education and healthcare facilities. Equipping them with proper safety gear will go a long way in saving lives.
Furthermore, Mr Speaker, I urge all community members, boat operators and all users of water transport, to strictly adhere to safety protocols when travelling on our water bodies. No life should be lost again because of noncompliance with basic safety rules. Together we can build a culture of safety and responsibility on our waterways. May the souls of the departed rest peacefully in the Lord, and may their families find comfort and strength during this difficult time.
I thank you once again, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity you have given me.
Hon Matthew Nyindam
Kpandai
Thank you, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity to contribute to the Statement ably made by my Aunty. My sympathies to the family that lost lives on the Volta Lake.
Mr Speaker, I know Statements are not supposed to generate debate, and I hope my contribution towards this Statement does not generate a debate. I want to start by saying that the Ministry of Transport and the Volta Lake Authority pay little attention to people who travel by lake. If you take the stretch Krachi to Kajeji, Makango to Yeji, from Lonto to Yeji, Dambai, all along Kitare stretch, the main means transport of the people who live along these areas is by boat. But unfortunately, these people travel without any protection and sometimes they stay on the lake for almost three hours. Some of the boats are such that they can carry about 50 to 100 people.
There is no regulation. The authorities see them and are unconcerned, but when disasters like this come up, we would be here to make Statements and complain. The authorities will go and donate one or two things and that ends the story. The following day, the same thing happens. So, I want to urge the Ministry of Transport and the Volta Lake Authority that they should take more interest because the attention that we give to these commuters is very poor.
It is so poor that if we as a nation do not put in measures to support these individuals, because it is privately owned, Government does not have any direct intervention when it comes to the use of the Volta Lake, apart from the pontoons that run from one end to the other. When it comes to the boats, they are privately owned. And because they are privately owned, Government does not give much attention to these areas. The maker of the Statement just spoke about the life jackets.
Mr Speaker, most of the people who use the lake do not put on their life jackets. Some do not even have it at all. So, I want to urge that in as much as we want to contribute and sympathise with families who lost their dear ones to this accident, I will pray that when this Statement ends, let us get the Ministry of Transport to come and tell this House how best they can support these private boat owners to give life jackets for free, and then get some control and do monitoring. You do not just give the jackets and that is it.
You give the jackets and put in measures to make sure that those people who board these pontoons or boats make use of them. If we all put in some of these measures, I am very positive-minded that we will save lives, instead of coming to the Floor to contribute and mourn people who lost their lives.
Thank you, Mr Speaker, for this opportunity
Hon Zuwera Mohammed Ibrahimah
Salaga South
Mr Speaker, thank you for the opportunity to contribute to the Statement made by my senior Colleague, the Hon Member for Krachi West.
Mr Speaker, those of us who have our constituencies bordering the Volta Lake wake up every morning and pray we do not get a phone call from the constituency announcing a boat cracking, a boat drowning, or a capsizing, because it has become the bane of our people. When this particular crash happened, and I heard about it, the first thing I did was to call the Municipal Chief Executive of my constituency to find out whether there were any persons from my constituency on the boat. He, in turn, called his colleague in Krachi West and reassured me that we had not suffered any casualties. The reason is that I share a border with Krachi West, and some constituents from Krachi West live in my constituency, and vice versa. When these things happen, it is not only about the people of Krachi West. It is about all of us; any of our relatives, our friends, or our associates could have been on that boat that day. So, it brings home the need for us to do something about this situation that keeps recurring.
Mr Speaker, not too long ago, we received a Statement from Hon Bede Ziedeng. The same thing had happened in his constituency. I think we need to look holistically at how we can address this situation. I think the Ghana Maritime Authority should begin to look at deploying safety boats so they are on hand immediately when a disaster strikes to assist victims. We can travel the whole stretch of the Volta Lake from Dambai to Kijewu and not see one single form of assistance for the users of the Lake. At the end of the day, it is the only mode of travel for these communities. They carry their goods; they carry their children.
In some of the lakeside communities that do not have schools, they ferry their children on boats to the next community with a school. Some of the communities do not have clinics. When a woman is in labour, she has to be ferried across the lake to the nearest community with a clinic. So, there is a whole developmental gap around this area of the Volta Lake. I think that it is about time that all of us make concerted efforts to look at how to bring relief to our people. It should not be the case that when our people get on the boat to cross to the next community, we are apprehensive. We should be able to relax knowing they are safe, will get to their destination, and will come home.
And that brings to mind, Mr Speaker, the quality of the boats on the lake. Because they are privately owned, as my Colleague said, no one pays attention. We, your Members of Parliament (MPs), sit in the boats on the lake when we go campaigning or visiting our constituents. And we will find a child with a bucket and a cup scooping water because there is leakage and water is getting into the boat. So if anyone loses attention and water collects in the boat, it sinks. We need to begin to look at the quality of boats on the river. We need to look at a licensing regime that will have a full protocol of assessments that boat owners must provide and physical inspections undertaken before they are licenced to operate on these lakes.
Mr Speaker, I want to add my voice to the Hon Member for Krachi West to thank all the people who came to her aid and the aid of the victims. Because invariably, when these things happen, it ends at the doorstep of the MP. The MP must bear the medical costs, burial costs, and the cost of evacuating the bodies. And so, once we get people to support us, we want to show appreciation and pray that they will keep giving so we can help our people along the lakes.
The people who live along the Volta Lake are Ghanaians Thank you very much, Mr Speaker. The Government needs to pay attention to them and find a way to mainstream them into this country’s development agenda. Thank you very much, Mr Speaker.
Hon Frank Annoh-Dompreh
Nsawam/Adoagyiri
Mr Speaker, let me show solidarity with our Colleague for the Statement made.
I am reliably informed that the incident occurred some three months ago. But it is still important to show solidarity and share in the pain of the victims of the constituency. I identify with Many of the regrets and views expressed by Members, except to add that, for instance, the White Volta, the Black Volta, and the Volta Lake serve as a very important means of transport.
Elsewhere in many parts of the world, such means of transport have been developed and serve as reliable means of transport. But in our parts of the world, we often take things for granted. The Ministry of Transport, for instance, comes in the wake. It is regrettable that most of the facilities on these water bodies do not have life jackets. They are basic facilities that should be found in these facilities. So it is not a matter we have to be labour. We should be revolving around the reasons life jackets and such safety measures cannot be upheld because no one can ever justify why these safety measures are not upheld on these transport facilities. And we keep losing lives every now and then. So I think the duty bearers would have to respond to this matter and track it down once and for all.
Accidents that occur as a result of compromised safety measures are things that we cannot tolerate and eventually lead to loss of life and loss of property. I think it is high time we drew the line and drew the curtains on these concerns. So it is important, and our hearts go out to the Hon Member. We cannot inflict pain on our people and we come to show regret and call for paltry sums of money or support for affected victims, even though these accidents could have been avoided.
So, Mr Speaker, not to belabour the point, we must call on all the duty bearers, particularly the Ministry of Transport and all the parastatal bodies who are involved, to let it be a thing of the past, and for us to bring finality to this needless and unavoidable accident that occurs on our water bodies. The last time I recall, Hon Bede Ziedeng had a cause to present a Statement in this House, and it was on the White Volta, and many lives were lost.
So, Hon Ntoso, our hearts go out to you, but we should use it as a springboard to inflict on other occurrences on the White Volta, the Black Volta and the other water bodies we have in our country, where these accidents are occurring every now and then, and to deal with them once and for all.
Mr Speaker, I thank you for the opportunity.
Hon Kofi Iddie Adams
Buem
Thank you very much, Mr Speaker, for the opportunity to make a few comments on the Statement made by our Colleague, the Member of Parliament for Krachi West, on this disaster that happened last year.
Mr Speaker, like other Members have indicated, this is not the first time we are experiencing such an occurrence. It happens, we come, we make Statements and after that it ends there. What is clearly necessary is the need to formalise the water transport system in this country. As some Members have indicated, the water transport system is supposed to be the safest and most reliable in many countries. Unfortunately, in Ghana, it is not the case. It is either we have failed to remove the stumps that need to be removed so that the path can be safe for them, or the boats that they use are so outmoded and are not water worthy.
Mr Speaker, in the same way that we take our vehicles to the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority (DVLA) examination points, for these vehicles to be examined for renewal of licences and road worthiness, same must apply to the boats so that there is a system to check whether these boats that are used to carry persons from one point to the other are truly water worthy, just as we do for vehicles. Mr Speaker, in most cases, enforcement is also key, but do we have enforcement systems at the riverbanks where they start from? Sometimes, no. If we have MTTD officers on our roads that deal with road transport, should it not be the case that we have something on the water transport system that will be checking this, and possibly even have water patrol units’ communication?
In aviation, there is always a tracking of every flight that moves from one airport to another. What happens to the boats when they are on the water bodies? Who checks where they are moving to? Who gives them the weather readings to know that this is the weather situation on the lake they are going to be moving on? So, it is important we formalise the system, but I am happy that the Hon Minister for Roads and Highways and the Government have commenced serious steps to build bridges over three critical water bodies, namely, the Oti Bridge, Volivo and Adawso-Ekye Amanfrom. That is a great step, and I believe we should extend some of these services to our normal water transport system.
We truly empathise with the families that have lost their loved ones and the two surviving ones. These are times when you ask yourself whether it was good to be alive or you should have joined your family because to lose nine family members; sometimes you ask yourself, if you should live or you should just join them. I know what they will be going through. It may not be enough just to give them some goods and services. We must extend clinical psychological help to them, because they will be going through a lot of trauma.
But Mr Speaker, the most important thing is to also make sure that we enforce rules. Some people will refuse to wear life jackets. They will either claim that it is dirty or that it has been worn by somebody else, so they do not want to wear it. For any person boarding a boat, whether they know how to swim or not, there is a need to insist that they wear a life jacket. So, it is not enough to mobilise more life jackets, but we must make sure that they wear them because it protects their lives. Mr Speaker, once again, we need to formalise our water transport system. It will even take off the pressure on our roads, and for communities that do not have such roads to use, and use the water transport system, this is the only way we can save them.
Mr Speaker, I do not pray for any Member to come and make a Statement yet again about such losses. We want to formalise the system. We want to make sure we insist and that people will do what we expect them to do when we donate some of these life jackets to them.
I wish to thank all donors, especially the Vice President, who made time to attend to them when the disaster occurred.
AskParly