OVER 100 people are dead or missing after nine interlocked canoes sank this week in the Democratic Republic of Congo, officials said on Saturday.
It was the latest in a series of maritime accidents in the sprawling country where people often travel on overloaded and unsafe vessels on the Congo, one of Africa’s biggest rivers.
Sixty-one bodies had been recovered from the sinking during the night of Monday to Tuesday, and another 60 are believed to be missing, Nestor Magbado, a spokesman for the governor of the northwestern province of Mongala, told AFP.
He said there were 39 survivors.
With no manifest of the passengers on board, the number missing is an estimate based on the capacity of the boat, he said.
The vessel was nine traditional wooden canoes, known as pirogues, all tied together, Magbado said.
He added that the accident may have been caused by “overcrowding aggravated by
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