GASABO - One student was killed and four others injured when a car drove into a procession of about 300 students from Kigali Institute of Management (KIM) Thursday evening. The students were walking around Kigali-Kayonza highway at around 7:10pm when a yet unnamed man driving a minibus, left the main road and drove straight into the crowd knocking down five students. One died on the spot while four others sustained severe injuries and were rushed to Kigali Central Hospital (CHUK) where they have been admitted in intensive care at the hospital. Eyewitnesses who talked to The New Times identified the deceased as Fred Gasasira, a first year student of Management at KIM. According the Chris Rulisa, an administrator at KIM, the suspect was arrested on the scene and taken to the police. Rulisa who was full of grief on the phone, said that the group was coming from a near-by memorial site and that everybody in the group had a lit candle. “Everybody could see that there was a big group of people from a distance there was nobody in the middle of road,” he explained. “We were all moving on the side of the road, and there wasn’t any other vehicle on the road,” Rulisa said. Among the group of mourners in the procession were officials from the National Unity and Reconciliation Commission (NURC), local leaders, Police and Military representatives. People who witnessed the tragedy suggested that the act was intentional. The Police spokesman, Marcel Higiro could not reveal the names of the criminal by press time. “He is with the police now and he did not have a driving license,” Higiro said. Asked whether the knocking was intended, Higiro said that physical facts by the traffic police indicates that “it’s a vehicle that knocked people” but hastened to add that the suspect is under interrogation. “The police are yet to establish if there was intentions to knock down the people, investigations are still going on,” Higiro said. Ends
