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‘MV Seahorse’ commission of inquiry starts sittings |26 November 2020

‘MV Seahorse’ commission of inquiry starts sittings

Chairman Renaud (centre) speaking at the introductory sitting yesterday (Photo: Thomas Meriton)

The Commission established to conduct inquiries into the incident involving the ‘MV Sea Horse’ landing craft off the coast of Coetivy island on August 25 and 26, 2018, is officially holding its first sitting as of this morning, as from 9am.

Appointed in September by former President Danny Faure, the commission is mandated to collect as much information as possible, to see what needs to be done, or what not to do in the future, in order to avoid similar circumstances by consulting witnesses, incident reports, the petition and the case that was before the Supreme Court into this matter, and to collate a report comprising recommendations if necessary, to be presented to the President in six months.

“This is an inquiry not an investigation, into the incident that happened on August 25-26, 2018, involving a landing craft vessel, by the name of MV Sea Horse, which happened not far from Coetivy island. Our inquiry will cover not only the incident that happened, but all the surrounding information will be collected, and collated in a report. As I said, this inquiry, we are trying to find out all information relating to the incident and then we are going to submit the report to the President, who had commissioned us.

“Now, we have a lot of information that we have collected. We have the investigation reports, statements from the police who carried out the investigations. We have information or a report which was collated by the Marine Accident Investigation Board, we have the inquiry in the presumption of death that was carried out. We have also the proceedings before the court, where there was an objection, there was a judicial review, we have the petition, the answer to the petition, the submissions of counsels and the ruling of report of that case,” said chairman of the commission Bernardin Renaud during yesterday’s introductory sitting.

Witnesses who are willing to voluntarily provide information regarding the incident are invited to come forward to the five-panel commission to give their names. The commission also has powers to summon other people who have an interest in the matter to provide information.

Two persons present yesterday expressed their intentions to provide their testimonies to the commission, and arrangements will be made to hear from them.

Chairman Renaud further made a declaration that two members of the present Board of inquiry were involved with preliminary investigations carried out by the Marine Accident Investigation Board, and declared their interests and the commission has considered whether this will affect their impartiality, and the commission concluded that it shall not affect impartiality on account that they are two professionals and their opinion will be based on expertise.

The commission consists of chairman Renaudand Captain Robert Morgan, Marc Brutus, Idney Basset and Joseph Athanasius as the four other members of the commission.

The commission is inquiring into the incident in which the MV Sea Horse caught fire. Only one out of five crew members managed to escape when the Sea Horse vessel caught fire almost two years ago, on August 26, 2018, off Coëtivy.

The cargo vessel operated by the Islands Development Company (IDC) left Mahé two days before (August 24) with fuel and food supplies for the Prison Services on Coëtivy.

The 25-metre vessel, which was being manned by a crew of five, arrived on the island in the evening of August 25 and remained at anchor some 200 metres from the shore, waiting for high tide to start offloading the cargo. This was planned for Sunday August 26 when unfortunately the fire incident happened.

The four other crew members have never been found.

 

Laura Pillay

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