Eid-el-fitri tragedy: Teenage boy drowns at Bar

An unidentified teenager drowned at the Bar
Beach, Lagos as revellers celebrated Eid-el-
fitri in the area on Friday.
A fun seeker, who witnessed the incident and
identified himself simply as Michael, said
there was a heavy traffic of persons at the
beach while there were only two live guards
on duty.
It is usual in metropolitan cities like Lagos
for residents to go to the beaches during
important national celebrations, especially
when holidays have been declared.
According to the witness, the teenage boy
was spotted by a few people who were
standing at the tip of the ocean.
He said three unidentified young men made
frantic attempts to see if they could rescue
the drowning boy, but they could not muster
enough courage to move into the centre of
the ocean.
He said the high waves of the surging ocean
were too much for the volunteers, who
eventually gave up the idea of saving the
victim.
According to him, all the fun seekers around
watched helplessly as the boy struggled and
was finally submerged by water.
However, other fun seekers continued with
their fun as if nothing had happened.
It was learnt that nobody came out to
complain about a missing person before
most of the fun seekers left the beach.
It was leant that a young lady initially raised
the alarm, believing erroneously that the
victim was her brother, but she soon kept
calm when she saw her own brother.
Spokesperson for the National Emergency
Management Agency, Ibrahim Farinloye, who
confirmed the tragedy on Friday, told
Saturday PUNCH that the victim had not
been identified.
"The body has been taken to the mortuary. It
is just sad that this had to happen despite
the warnings we issued that people should
stay off the beach because of an impending
ocean surge," he said.
Farinloye said the warning issued by NEMA
stated that there might be an ocean surge of
a minimum of four days and maximum of
five days, appealing to revellers to avoid
swimming at the beach for some days.
"People are allowed to go to the beach but
they should not swim. For some months, the
ocean had been monitored and the warnings
NEMA issued were consistent with the signs
that were noticed, which showed that there
might be an ocean surge," he said.