Victims of the Apiatse in the Western region have been advised to seek advice from the law profession and explore going to court to seek settlement from the company that owned the dynamite.
It has been suggested that the mining company and its licensees and transporters who were in charge of the explosives that went off, owed a duty of care to the communities in which the product was transported.
“They owed the general public a duty of care, and to exercise all caution to prevent exactly what happened,” says our columnist in the latest edition of the column Periscope Depth, which appears in the Daily Searchlight every Wednesday.
It has been reported that at least 17 people were killed after a DAF Truck transporting a large consignment of explosives exploded following an accident with a motorcycle.
The columnist describes as ‘unthinkable’ that such a large consignment of very dangerous material could be transported without sufficient warning to the world at large that a very harmful product was on the highway and that all should keep at bay.
“It is unthinkable” he says.
He said that the owners and handlers of the explosives owed a duty of care to the world at large, to ensure that the world was sufficiently warned that what they carried was very harmful, and to alert the public to keep their distance.
“I am saying that that vehicle should have been preceded by a lead car sufficiently marked to warn the public. It should also have been followed by a back-up vehicle sufficiently marked to demonstrate to the world that explosives were being transported.
“I am saying that the vehicle itself should have had a siren on top, and sufficiently marked and lighted to warn the world to keep away.
“I am saying that the eventual users of this very harmful product had a great responsibility to ensure that it contracted a company with the highest ethical and practical standards when it comes to the transportation of explosives, and that for failing to do so, the mining company must pay, in the only way that would hurt them, in their pockets.
“The victims of Apiate should go to court, and ask for half a billion dollars from Chirano Mines. I am almost certain, if they hire lawyers who know what they are doing, that they would come away with much, much money,” he wrote.
The consignment of explosives was owned by Canadian mining company Chirano gold mine, about 140km (87 miles) from the scene of the blast, when it was hit by a motorcycle, police say.
The company has already denied liability in the press, and is blaming Maxam Security, who were charged with transporting the product.
The government has already acted in the matter by interdicting the Chief Inspector of Mines and Explosives in Ghana.
(The Daily Searchlight appears on the newsstands every weekday and is also available for sale on www.ghananewsstand.com)
