AFP - Nine people drowned and 100 were reported missing when a boat capsized and sank Monday on a river in the centre of the Democratic Republic of Congo, river authorities said Tuesday.
   
"The boat HB Trans Nyalongo sank Monday around 10 am (0900 GMT) at the junction of the Sumbuji and Kasai rivers, 95 kilometres from Tshikapa" in Kasai Occidental province, said Albert Beya, river commissioner for Tshikapa.
   
"Nine bodies have been found, 40 people saved and 100 passengers are still unaccounted for," he added, stating that the boat, which was carrying at least 150 people plus farm produce, had been recovered from the river bottom.
   
The boat, which was making its way from Maimbi to Tshikapa, probably sank because it was overloaded and ran into a strong current, Beya added.
   
A mixed team of naval and harbour authorities have deployed at the port of Kavudi, near where the accident took place, in case more bodies surface.
   
The accident comes after a September 13 shipwreck on the Congo river in the southeastern Katanga province. Ninety people drowned in that accident and 25 were reported missing.
   
More than 200 people were known to have been on board the vessel that only had a capacity of 55.
   
River transport is widely used in the DR Congo, which has several major waterways including the Congo river, which is 4,700 kilometres (2,915 miles) long.
   
However, boats frequently capsize on lakes and rivers, partly because of overloading, when cargo manifests are sometimes fraudulently filled in, and partly because of the bad signposting of navigable waterways.
   
Most boats lack navigational safeguards including signal lamps, lifebelts and lifejackets.