Government through the Department of Disaster Management Affairs, on Saturday, 3rd October, 2020 provided financial support towards funeral arrangements to families whose relations died in a road accident on Friday at Mlanda, in Ntcheu District.

Thirteen people died and four sustained various degree of injuries when a Yutong Bus collided with a Toyota Hiace Minibus at around 9pm.

The four were rushed to Dedza District Hospital, which referred a five-year-old critically injured child to Kamuzu Central Hospital. Government has also provided financial support to the injured.

Speaking when he visited the injured at Dedza District Hospital, Deputy Director of Disaster Response and Recovery Dyce Nkhoma said government was deeply saddened by the accident.

Nkhoma, who was in the company of District Commissioners for Ntcheu [Gift Matewere] and Dedza [Emmanuel Bulukutu] wished the injured a quick recovery.

On his part, Matewere narrated his life experience saying he was once involved in an accident which left him with a fractured arm.

“I was involved in a road accident some six years ago, at Dwangwa in Nkhotakota and I got healed. I am optimistic that you too, will make it,” said Matewere.

One of the injured person’s story is traumatic. At the time of the accident, she was heading to Ntcheu aboard the minibus, in the company of her husband and her two and five –year-old sons, to attend to her late bother’s funeral ceremony.

Both her husband and the two-year-old child died on the spot, while the five-year-old, who was referred to Kamuzu Central Hospital, died in the wee hours of Sunday, 4th October, 2020.

Following the demise of the five-year-old child, death toll in the accident has risen to 14.