A boat accident at a jetty in a Badagry community in Lagos State has led to the death of a 32-year-old man, the News Agency of Nigeria reported.
According to sources, the accident occurred at the jetty on Thursday night after a head-on collision between two boats; one coming from Badagry and another from Lagos. A resident of the community, Mr Victor Idowu, told NAN on Friday in Badagry that the incident occurred at 10:05p.m, at a jetty in Akarakumo.
He said, “The sound and voice of the boatmen woke up residents of the community who came out to see what happened. One of the passengers was crushed during the incident and fell inside the water. The residents and the boat man assisted to bring him out of the water. We brought him out of the lagoon and discovered that he had been injured in the chest. While some suggested that he should be taken to a private hospital, I told them that a General Hospital should be the best.’’
Idowu claimed that when they got to the hospital, there was no doctor to attend to the victim. He said that the victim was given first aid treatment and was in pain until 4.10a.m when they took him away for X-ray.
“Coming back from where we went for the x-ray, he gave up the ghost immediately,” he said.
However, Medical Director, General Hospital, Badagry, Dr Olatunde Bakare, told NAN that the man was brought into the hospital in the middle of the night with a serious chest injury.
Bakare stated, “His two ribs had been broken. We wanted to refer him to another hospital in Lagos because we could not handle his case. But we realised that if we sent him to Lagos then, he might not get to half of the way before he would die. So, we had to stabilise him; this morning, they had done X-ray for him. When he was coming out, he died due to the seriousness of the injury.’’
He added that the man was properly attended to by the hospital workers, noting that his injury was fatal which resulted in his death.
The Head of Operations, Lagos State Waterways Authority, Mr Ibrahim Famuyiwa, told NAN that one of their stakeholders in Badagry had reported the incident to him. He said he was waiting to get the other side of the story from their workers in the area to harmonise it.
Source: NAN