The lifeless body of a 16-year-old first year student of the University Practice Senior High School (UPSHS), was in the early hours of Friday found on the seashore near Saint Augustine’s College in Cape Coast.
The body of Shadrach Ekow Arthur, believed to have drowned while swimming in the stretch of the sea near Duakor, a fishing community close to the University of Cape Coast (UCC) on Thursday, has since been deposited at the Cape Coast Teaching Hospital morgue for autopsy.
The father of the deceased, Mr. Thomas Ekow Arthur, a 54-year-old unemployed, resident of Apewosika near the University of Cape Coast, in an interview on Monday said, on that fateful Thursday, he left the deceased at home for a church programme in the company of his elder brother.
He said the deceased, a General Arts student, was unable to attend the programme with him as he usually did, because of some assignment he had to complete before school re-opened on Monday, May 5.
Mr Arthur said while he was at the church programme, he received a phone call that his son had drowned, so he rushed to the beach, but on reaching there, efforts by him, some church and family members to retrieve the body were unsuccessful, until the lifeless body of the deceased was found on Friday morning by some fishermen.
The elder brother of the deceased could not also explain how his late brother got to the beach, but said the deceased was in the house until around 1600 hours when suddenly he could not be found, only to hear of his death later.
Family and friends who gathered at the deceased’s house described him as a very intelligent, humble, respectful and hardworking boy, whose attributes won him many academic awards while in basic school.
The UCC Police confirmed the incident, and said they were collaborating with the Metropolitan Police to launch investigations into the matter.
In a related development, the body of a 75-year-old fisherman from Duakor, Ababio Agbeyo, was also washed ashore on Friday.
Source: GNA