Cameroon: Road accident claims 53 lives

By Aurore Bonny

LOME, Togo (AA) - Over 53 people were killed and many others injured as a passenger bus collided with an oil tanker on late Tuesday night in the western province of Dschang in the Menoua department, West Cameroon region, national radio reported.

According to Awa Fonka Augustine, the governor of the western region, the dead have not been identified so far, while passengers with serious injuries have been taken to hospital. He explained that the oil truck had a brake failure and there was also fog in the area of the accident.

According to reports, there were around 70 passengers in the bus.

Road accidents are a recurrent problem in Cameroon, resulting in deaths. According to the World Health Organization, the Central African country records an average of more than 16,000 road accidents each year, which kill more than 1,200 people.

In a recent interview with local media, Transport Minister Jean Ernest Massena Ngalle Bibehe claimed: "The number of deaths on our roads is falling. It fell from 1,588 in 2011 to 1,091 in 2015 and 937 in 2019."