Family members who were preparing to send their dead relative to the mortuary were stunned when he suddenly woke up and called for a Roman Catholic priest to baptise him.

The Ghanaian Times, which carries the story, says Opanin Kwasi Mensah, 80, died at home on Thursday night at "Number Three", a suburb Sunyani.

As the family members were about to send him to the Sunyani Government Hospital mortuary on Friday, he woke up at 11 am. The family, after recovering from the shock, obliged his request and quickly brought in a Catholic Priest, Rev Father Augustine, who performed the baptismal rite and conferred the name, "Joseph" on him, after which he died.

A family source told the 'Times' that Opanin Mensah died at 2 pm on Friday and the body was deposited at the hospital's mortuary. According to the source, Opanin Mensah claimed that he met some people on his 'death journey' who prevented him from entering a room because he was not baptised. He put up a fierce challenge but the people would not budge. He suddenly came back to life while he was insisting to enter that room.

According to the paper, its efforts to contact Father Augustine proved futile as he could not be reached at his office.