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No dynamite explosion at Santa Maria

Mr Mohammed Bashiru, the Municipal Chief Executive (MCE) for Ga Central has debunked rumours that there was a dynamite explosion at Santa Maria, a rocky area in Accra.There were media reports that a dynamite blast occurred at Santa Maria on Tuesday at ...

Mr Mohammed Bashiru, the Municipal Chief Executive (MCE) for Ga Central has debunked rumours that there was a dynamite explosion at Santa Maria, a rocky area in Accra.

There were media reports that a dynamite blast occurred at Santa Maria on Tuesday at about 1500 hours.

Mr Bashiru told the Ghana News Agency on Wednesday that preliminary investigations by an intelligence team from the Ministry of Defense and other security agencies showed that no blast had occurred in the area.

He added that though the actual incident, leading to a victim Georgina Fiave suffering an injury on her toe was yet to be established, the team confirmed that there was no blast.

“Experts from the Ministry of Defense, the Intelligence Unit and other Security Agencies were on the ground this morning. We were looking up to see topsoil destroyed, damaged buildings, and evidence of explosion…we combed the entire area without finding any evidence,” the MCE said.

“When we went to the scene, eyewitnesses kept telling us different sides of the story together. Even the spot they claimed was the evidential spot of the explosion; three people who came pointed to three different places, and none of the locations has evidence of explosion as the experts observed,” he said.

He said they visited the victim, Georgina Fiave, a groundnut seller, at the Anyaa Polyclinic, and met her in a “very calm situation,” adding that she had a lengthy discussion with the team, narrating how the incident happened in less than two minutes.

“Her toe has been fixed, it’s not ripped off. She’s alright; she can walk, sit, talk, and if you’re not told that she’s the one that the whole story is revolving around, you won’t know,” he emphasised.

“She told us that she stepped on something, and there was a loud noise, and she didn’t know she was injured until someone drew her attention,” Mr Bashiru narrated.

While urging people to be on the lookout, he cautioned against raising a false alarm.

Earlier, Nana Kofi Boandwoah, Assemblyman for the area also said that he was informed by some residents that there had been an explosion, which he reported to the National Disaster Management Organisation (NADMO).

“I had to rush to the scene, and I reported to NADMO and all the stakeholders involved. We went to the scene but unfortunately, we couldn’t even locate where the blast came from but they [residents] just heard a blast from the ground,” he said.

In January this year, Ghana was thrown into a state of mourning after a truck conveying mining explosives on behalf of Maxam Ghana Limited from Tarkwa to Chirano Gold Mines in the Western North Region was involved in an accident at Appiatse.

The accident resulted in an explosion, which claimed 13 lives, injured hundreds and displaced the whole town making it the worst explosion disaster ever recorded in the history of the country.

The Government, after investigations, asked Maxam Ghana to pay a fine of one million dollars for regulatory breaches but the Company decided to pay an additional five million dollars as a goodwill gesture to the country.

The President, Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, directed that the additional US$ 5 million be donated to the Appiatse Support Fund, established to help reconstruct the community.

Source: Ghana News Agency

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