Zimbabwe crash involving church minibus kills 27

A minibus carrying churchgoers collided head-on with a truck in central Zimbabwe, resulting in at least 27 fatalities and seven injuries, according to police. The minibus, operated by a popular Indigenous African Christian denomination, was traveling to a conference when the accident occurred near the town of Chivhu, approximately 140 kilometers south of Harare.

Both vehicles were carrying an unspecified number of passengers. Footage shared on social media depicted the severely damaged minibus. Authorities noted that 94% of road accidents in the region are caused by human error. Many Zimbabweans rely on privately operated minibus taxis, known as kombis, for daily transportation, often criticized for exceeding passenger capacity limits.

The roads in Zimbabwe are plagued by potholes due to underfunding and neglect, coupled with poor driving standards. In April, a minibus crash in southern Zimbabwe claimed the lives of 18 people, while another incident in the same month saw a woman and her five children perish in a collision on a Zimbabwe-South Africa highway. Road fatalities claim about 300,000 lives annually across Africa, constituting roughly a quarter of the global road death toll, according to the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa.

Africa, home to 1.5 billion people, accounts for only about 3% of the world's vehicle fleet, yet has the world's highest road fatality rate.