Investigate cause of Salah stampede - Group charges minister

A group calling itself Bureau of Public Safety has called on the Minister of Interior Prosper Bani to investigate circumstances leading to the Asawase stampede.

Nine persons died on Wednesday at Asawase Community Center when a jam to mark the end of Ramadan turned fatal after an alarm culminated in a stampede.

Six of the deceased were females and three males.

‘We would be very much interested to examine to what extent the Community Centre in question complied with the LI 1724 of the Ghana National Fire Service and other local authority regulations with regard to occupancy limits, among others,’ Nana Yaw Akwada, Executive Director of the group said.

Below is the full statement:

TO ALL MEDIA HOUSES ASAWASE STAMPEDE: NOT UNFAMILIAR TO GHANA’S PUBLIC SAFETY MISHAPS

We are saddened by the loss of lives in this incident and we wish to call on the Minister of Interior to investigate circumstances leading to this incident and cause recommendations arising out of same to be implemented across the nation.

Indeed we, at the Bureau of Public Safety, are very indignant that as a nation with public safety institutions and elaborate laws and regulations, Ghana still finds a place in the news for reasons not unfamiliar.

If appointing authorities cannot hold individuals tasked to ensure public safety accountable; the citizens should not be denied the benefit of non-recurrence through investigation and publication of reports.

We would be very much interested to examine to what extent the Community Centre in question complied with the LI 1724 of the Ghana National Fire Service and other local authority regulations with regard to occupancy limits, among others.

We would also need to understand circumstances that led to the celebrants defying police orders to end the program at a certain time, and furthermore what exactly happened in the course of the program leading to that stampede which proved fatal for some nine persons and other injured persons.

The Bureau of Public Safety wish to commiserate with families who lost their loved ones in this stampede in the early hours of Thursday 7th July, 2016 and encourage same to join in the call for proper investigation into the disaster, publish findings and cause recommendations to apply to all event centre across the country.

We trust that the Minister of Interior will show commitment to public safety by heeding our call this time around. ——-SIGNED——— Nana Yaw Akwada (EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR)