Three persons – two women and a man – have lost their lives following a boat accident which happened on Saturday evening off Round Island, about half way between La Digue and Praslin.

Named ‘Faith’, the converted Mini Mahé with a 15 horse power engine and added cabin had left La Digue about half an hour before and was on its way to Praslin with six persons on board. They had spent the day at the island’s feast.

According to information gathered by our reporter on La Digue and later confirmed by police spokesman Jean Toussaint, the boat capsized in the Ros Kannal area after a lady – Cynthia César – had fallen over board and the other occupants all moved on one side to try and retrieve her.

After the accident, which occurred at about 7pm, the boat’s skipper and owner, Teddy Stravens, managed to swim to the ‘Mary Anne’, a yacht which was then moored off La Digue. The crew took him back to the accident area and after they could find neither sign of his boat nor of any passengers, they brought him back to the island.

The alert had then been given and an intensive nearly 15-hour coordinated search followed. It was conducted by the Seychelles Coast Guard, Air Force, Seychelles Maritime Safety Administration (SMSA) and Marine Police with the help of local aviation company Zil Air, Australian navy vessel HMS Perth and various vessels from Praslin and La Digue. These included the smallest vessel of the ‘Cat Coco’which is based on La Digue and Praslin’s ‘Cat Rose’.

After the night search proved unsuccessful, rescue operations resumed early Sunday morning. By mid day, two persons – Aubrey Jacqueline and six-year-old Rio Chang Tave – were pulled alive from the relatively rough seas. Three other persons were unfortunately found dead. They have been identified as Cynthia and Helena César, and Bernard Camille aged 65 years old.

Michel Godley, normally a sailor on one of the tankers of Seychelles Petroleum Company (Seypec) who helped in the rescue operations on board the ‘Lady Caroline’ skippered by Louis d’Offay, was spending the weekend on La Digue. He recounts how Aubrey Jacqueline and Rio Chang Tave were saved.

The ambassador of the People’s Republic of China to Seychelles, Yin Lixian, yesterday donated a set of computers and laserjet printers to the Seychelles police department in Victoria.

It forms part of the China’s contribution to the department’s planned database management system project.

The equipment, consisting of 20 computers and 12 laserjet printers of the Lenovo brand, were handed over to the Seychelles Commissioner of Police, Reginald Elizabeth in the presence of Charles Bastienne, Minister for Home Affairs, senior officials and management members of the Seychelles police and officials from the Chinese embassy in Seychelles.

This was later followed by the signing of the handing over documents between ambassador Lixian and Minister Bastienne.

The Ministry of Home Affairs is to introduce a new database management system for the police department which will link all stations, including the Criminal Investigation Department, to enable information sharing across the country.

In his address of appreciation, Commissioner Elizabeth referred to a previous meeting with the media where he expressed the need for the police department to embrace technology for professionalism and for better service delivery to the community.

“This donation of twenty new computer sets and twelve new printers from one of our generous partners has come at a very opportune time indeed and will no doubt play a significant role in making the anticipated fully-fledged network system to be commissioned soon, a reality,” said the police commissioner, adding the donation is a big step forward in that direction.