ARMED ROBBERS ATTACK PASSENGERS, KILL TWO (D/G, Wednesday, April 15, 2009.PAGE 31)

Two persons died on the spot, while four others were injured when a gang of armed robbers attacked a 207 Benz bus on which they were travelling from Tamale to Bolgantaga at Karimenga, near Pwalugu, last Sunday.
The dead were a young girl and a man whose identities were not immediately known at the time of filing this report. The injured, including the driver, Alhassan Mamudu, 48, Barikisu Forkor, 36, and Adiya Abdulai 18, who sustained gunshot wounds, were admitted to the Bolgatanga Regional Hospital.
Six other passengers who sustained minor injuries were also admitted to the same hospital where they were treated and discharged.
A Burkinabe and five volunteers from different European countries, as well as other passengers on board the same bus, escaped unhurt.
The driver of the bus, with registration number AS 7970 R, told journalists from his sick bed at the hospital that they were attacked by armed robbers when the bus got to Karimenga in the Talensi-Nabdam District in the Upper East Region late afternoon on Sunday.
He explained that while the bus was in the process of climbing a hill at the section of the road, he heard gunshots whose bultets hit his front tyres, leading to the blast of one of them.
He said he later heard voices ordering him to stop. According to him, due to the blasted tyre, he couldn’t move further. The robbers, who had masked their faces, moved to the vehicle and ordered all occupants to come down.
He said at gunpoint, the robbers matched them into a nearby bush and ordered them to lie down while they (robbers) mounted a search on them.
He said monies and other valuables including some mobile phones, and digital cameras belonging to the white volunteers, were taken away.
An 18-year-old, Adiya Abdulai, a final-year student at the Damongo Senior High School, reported that her GH¢350 was taken away by the robbers. According to her, the money was meant to buy tomatoes from Navrongo to sell.
The passengers said at the time their bus was stopped at Karimenga another Benz bus from Bolgatanga to Tamale had been stopped by the same robbers at gunpoint.
Meanwhile, police personnel from the Northern and Upper East regions have been deployed to the area to mount a search with the view to arresting the culprits.