Loved ones seek support to repatriate minivan crash victims to Papua New Guinea

Grieving loved ones have confirmed the identities of two victims of a fatal minivan crash in Victoria’s north where four people died.

Members of Shepparton’s Papua New Guinean (PNG) community have confirmed that 17-year-old Jamie Kakon and 51-year-old Linda Kulia were among the four people who died at the scene near Muckatah, south of Cobram, on Monday. 

Mr Kakon and Ms Kulia are among nine people who were driving in a minivan along a country road when it lost control and crashed into a tree. 

Police have confirmed the two other deceased are from the local Congolese community. 

Four people were killed when a minivan hit a tree near Cobram in Victoria’s north. (ABC News)

Three teenagers have been taken to hospital along with a 39-year-old man who remains under police guard. 

Shepparton man Simon Mack said he was from the same village in PNG as Ms Kulia.

“We were from the same village, but different tribes,” he said.

“We knew each other back in PNG and when we moved to Australia we gathered round like a family, we do things together.

“We are very close to each other.”

He described Ms Kulia as a lovely and very friendly woman who loved everyone.

“She takes part in all the community organisations,” he said.

“We are really going to miss her.”

He said as far as he was aware Ms Kulia was living in Mooroopna and working in child care at the time of the crash.

Mr Mack said the other victim, Jamie Kakon, was in Australia on a student visa and had been studying in Melbourne.

“School closed for Christmas last week, and he was up here (in northern Victoria) on holidays,” Mr Mack said.

The crash happened on a narrow road in a farming area near Cobram. (ABC News)

He said the situation was “traumatising”, but the local community was coming together to support each other.

“Everyone is coming in to share their condolences … we are sitting together to work out how we can repatriate their bodies,” he said.

He said he had heard the group was in the minivan after being out at a farm earlier in the day.

“I think they were picking cherries … I wasn’t there so I wouldn’t disclose much information, but [people] are saying they came back from picking and on the way home they got into the tragic accident,” he said.

Margrette Nii said the Papua New Guinean community was in shock as it was something they had “never experienced”. 

“I couldn’t’ work the whole day,” she said. 

PNG government ready to assist

Ms Nii said the community did not have the funds to repatriate the bodies from Shepparton and are looking for support from the PNG and Australian governments.

Community members had suggested cremation but family members back in PNG, including Mr Kakon’s parents and Ms Kulia’s son, want to see their faces before they receive a funeral, Ms Nii said. 

PNG’s Foreign Affairs Minister Justin Tkatchenko said it was an “absolutely tragic event”. 

Justin Tkatchenko says the PNG government is ready to assist with repatriation.  (Facebook: Justin Tkatchenko)

“At this point of time we are waiting for a full police report, which has not been forwarded to us as yet, to the Honorary Consul in Sydney so we don’t know the full details of how the accident happened, or how the death of two PNG nationals occurred,” he said.

“But in any case, we will assist wherever we can, especially for the relatives, the parents and those that are in grief are in this tragic scenario.”

Mr Tkatchenko said once the PNG government had received the full details it would assist with repatriation “as best we possibly can”.

“When we get all the appropriate information, we’ll make sure that the deceased ship back, as in the most proper way, appropriate,” he said.

The whole community along with friends and family of the two came from Melbourne to Shepparton to mourn their loss, Ms Nii said. 

Ms Nii had only met Mr Kakon for the first time a few days before his death, describing him as a “gentle” person. 

She remembered Ms Kulia as “sweet”, full of humour and “easy to approach”. 

“It’s a very difficult situation in the community right now,” she said.