2 pastors drown in exercise of faith

Two senior pastors of the Church of Pentecost drowned in the Kparekpare stream in the Krachi East District of the Volta Region on Saturday afternoon when they put their faith to test.

The incident occurred when the two - Apostle K.K.C. Gadzekpo, the Hohoe Area Head of the Church of Pentecost, and Pastor Kamara Wilheminga, in charge of the Tokorano Pentecost Assembly - as well as two others, were travelling to Dambai to attend the induction ceremony of their colleague pastor whose name was not immediately known.

The two others, identified as Mrs Gadzekpo, wife of Apostle Gadzekpo, and Elder Freeman, miraculously escaped death by a whisker.

On reaching Kparekpare in the afternoon, a heavy downpour in the morning had caused the stream and other streams in the area to overflow their banks, a situation which rendered the road impassable and cut the Krachi East and West districts from the southern part of the country.

The driver of the vehicle, Elder Freeman, as well as the village folk, advised that the delegation should wait for the floods to subside before continuing the journey but Apostle Gadzekpo, who was expected to chair the induction ceremony, refused to take the advice.

Accusing the driver of having little faith, Apostle Gadzekpo rather took the keys to the vehicle from the driver, sat behind the wheels and drove the vehicle through the floods while the crowd screamed in the background.

Midway through the flooded waters, the engine went off and the water swept the car downstream.

Luck or faith

	One of the dead being rescued

But fortunately for them the vehicle was held by trees and a team of volunteers rushed to their rescue.

The driver and Mrs Gadzekpo fell but managed to hold onto branches of the trees while the apostle and his colleague pastor remained trapped in the vehicle where they died before rescuers could reach them.

The apostle's body was retrieved seven minutes later but it took the rescuers nearly two hours to bring the driver and Mrs Gadzekpo out of the stream because the tides were so strong that it was difficult to swim with them ashore.

The other pastor's body was retrieved at 5.15 p.m. when the level of the stream had receded a little.

The bodies were later conveyed to Hohoe late Saturday and deposited at the Hohoe Government Hospital for autopsy and further investigations.

A resident of the village, Mr Nyande Kwasi, told the Daily Graphic that he had witnessed the flooding of the stream on many occasions and attributed the situation to the fact that the culverts were too small to contain the streams during the rainy season.

He said although new culverts had been built as part of construction process currently underway they were equally too small and some had started breaking down less than six months after their construction.


Credit: Manasseh Azure Awuni
Source: Daily Graphic/Ghana