By Samuel Oyadongha, Yenagoa
Boat operators in Bayelsa State who failed to provide their passengers with life jacket may now be barred from plying the creeks.

The move, it was learnt, was part of measures taken to stem the rising cases of avoidable deaths resulting from boat mishaps in the waterways.

Bayelsa is predominantly riverine with labyrinth of creeks while most of its far flung communities in the deep mangrove swamp are not linked by road and could only be accessed by water.

The ‘operation life jacket’ measure Saturday Vanguard gathered may have been informed by tragic event of penultimate week in which two promising corps members lost their lives in tragic boat mishap along the Nembe creek.

The deceased corps members like many others who had drowned and lost their lives in the past were not putting on life jacket, a development which also forced the National Youths Service Corps directorate in the state to issue stern warning to its officials and corps members against embarking on riverine trips without putting on life jacket and unauthorized journeys.

Our correspondent who was in the creek yesterday observed that all the passengers on speedboats especially on the Brass-Nembe routes were made to put on life jacket before venturing into the creek while the marine police were on hand to ensure compliance with the directive reportedly put in place by the maritime workers union in the wake of the rising incidence of death resulting from boat mishaps.

Virtually all the passengers including the boat drivers sighted on the waterways were donning life jacket as against the practice in the past where most of the boat operators failed to provide their passengers with such safety wears as well as the refusal of some passengers to wear the safety kits provided them on the ground that they are stained with oily substance and may soil their clothes.

A boat driver who confirmed the development said it is now an offence for passengers to travel on their boats without life jacket.

According to him, the marine police will not allow any boat driver venture into the creek unless every passenger has life jacket.

Also reacting to the development, the field coordinator of Environmental Rights Action (ERA) in Bayelsa State, Comrade Alagoa Morris who criss-crosses the creek regularly in the course of carrying out his assignment while commending the authorities for the bold initiative called for the sustenance of the order with a view to curbing what he described as avoidable deaths in the waterways resulting from boat mishaps.