At least seven people lost their lives on Thursday morning when a Fuso truck carrying logs lost its lane and collided with an oncoming coaster omnibus in an accident that occurred along the Kigali-Huye highway, in Rugarika sector of Kamonyi District. Police and emergency services were rushed to the scene while the injured have been transported to hospital. The accident took place at around 6:00am and it also involved a Toyota pick-up that was hit by the coaster after the collision. Speaking to The New Times, Chief Inspector of Police Sylvestre Twajamahoro, the Southern Province Police Spokesperson said that besides seven people who immediately passed on, two others are in critical condition. Besides the driver of the pick-up, the rest of the casualties were passengers on the omnibus. It is said that about ten people were injured altogether. “We are following up and we shall provide more details in due course,” he said. The Fuso- truck was heading to Kigali from Muhanga, when it knocked the Toyota coaster passenger omnibus that belongs to a local company called Capital Express. The driver of the Coaster survived the accident while the driver of the Fuso, which overturned in the road after the collision survived and immediately escaped, according to police. The Fuso is reported to have lost brakes when it lost its way to crush into the passenger service vehicle. Twajamahoro urged drivers to be careful and avoid transporting cargo that exceed the capacity of cars, and always ensure their vehicles are in good mechanical conditions. Rwanda National Police figures show that every year, they register over 5,000 road accidents that kill more than 500 people while over 2,000 survive with serious injuries and 4, 000 with minor injuries. At least 80 percent of these accidents are caused by reckless human behaviors. With the contribution of the 52-week long road safety awareness campaign, Gerayo Amahoro, which was launched on May 19 last year, the number of road accidents reduced to 4,661 cases in 2019, from 5,661 that were recorded in 2018, an equivalent of 17 percent reduction.
