KANO: More than 100 people are feared dead after a boat carrying mostly women and children capsized in Nigeria, rescue workers said as more bodies were pulled from the River Niger on Thursday. About 300 passengers were on their way to celebrate the Muslim Mawlid festival in north-central Niger when the accident happened on Tuesday, the state’s emergency agency said. Now 36 dead bodies have been found and 150 survivors have been rescued, spokesman Ibrahim Audu Husseini told AFP. “We recovered 20 more bodies today. This brings the number of bodies recovered from the river to 36.” “There is no possibility” of finding anyone else alive, he said. “There is no way a human can survive three days underwater. The task now is to retrieve all the missing bodies.” The agency did not specify the cause of the sinking in Gbajibo community near Mokwa, but said it happened after dark around 8.30pm. (1930 GMT). Boating accidents are common on Nigeria’s poorly regulated waterways, especially during the rainy season when rivers and lakes swell. The Nigerian Waterways Authority has tried in the past to ban night travel on the rivers, saying overloading the vessels is a criminal offence, but crews often flout the rules. Last month, an overloaded boat carrying over 50 farmers sank across the Gummi River in Zamfara State. More than 40 are believed to have died. In June 2023, more than 100 people died when a riverboat carrying about 250 passengers capsized in the north-central state of Kwara, one of the deadliest accidents on the country’s waterways in recent years. In a statement Thursday, Nigerian President Bola Ahmed Tinubu expressed his condolences to the victims and called for an investigation into the recent boat accidents. “President Tinubu commiserates with the families of the victims and prays for the repose of the souls of the dead,” the presidency said. The President called on officials to ensure that boat operators who violate the night travel ban are brought to justice. Tinubu also thanked the rescuers and commended the local divers who are assisting in the search.
