At least 28 people died on Saturday night in one of the worst traffic accidents in Tanzania in recent years, authorities said today.

The brakes of a truck broke, causing it to collide with two vehicles, of which a small bus, before all three fall into the stream of a river in the southwestern part of the country, near the border with Zambia, said local police commander in a statement.

The truck carried a wheat flour from Dar Salam to Zambia, and its brakes were damaged as it went down a steep slope. The truck then collided with the bus and another vehicle before all three dropped on the river Balizi river, the police commander said.

Among the 28 victims are 10 women and four children, and the injured are eight, the police commander added, attributing the accident to the “negligence” of the truck driver, “who lost control of his vehicle on the steep slope of Juanby”.

President Sama Soulouhou Hassan, in a message on the X platform, expressed her condolences to the families of the victims.

“I pray for all these souls who have left to rest in eternal peace and for the injured to regain their health,” the president said in a statement issued today.

Deadly traffic accidents often sink into mourning Tanzania.

In February 2024, at least 25 people were killed, including an American, a South African and a Kenyanist, and 21 were injured in the northern part of the country in a collision between a truck and three vehicles.

In October 2022, at least 23 people were killed and another 37 were injured in a collision between a bus and a truck.

In a 2018 Road Safety report, the World Health Organization (WHO) said that the official statistics of Tanzania in 2016 recorded 3,256 traffic deaths, but estimates that the actual number ranged between 13,000 and 19,000.