Death list duo alive and well

Source: The National - Wednesday, October 19th 2011 By FRANK SENGE KOLMA INVESTIGATIONS into the Madang Dash 8 crash has taken a bizarre twist with revelations that two of the “dead” passengers were in fact not on the ill-fated flight last Thursday. The two, Petrus Akau and Ronald Bibi, named on the flight manifest, are very much alive, investigators have learned. Akau and Bibi had given their tickets to two other passengers who Madang provincial police commander last night named as Bernard James (for Akau) and Divu Langa (for Bibi). In its attempt to contact all 28 relatives of persons on the manifest of Dash 8 aircraft, Airlines PNG turned up two passengers whose names were on the manifest but who had given away their tickets to two other persons. This revelation further complicates the already difficult process of establishing the identity of all the 28 bodies that have been badly charred in the fiery crash near Marakum village in the Raicoast area. Whether they are relatives who were offered the tickets or other persons who bought the tickets off the two passengers on the flight manifest remained a mystery.

Brother and sister John Paul and Paula Matlam in the company of Prime Minister Peter O’Neill at Madang’s Divine Word University yesterday. They lost family members in the Airlines PNG Dash 8 aircraft disaster last Thursday.