The driver of a haulage truck that was involved in an accident that claimed the lives of 16 church members along the Harare-Masvingo highway on Friday last week is facing 16 culpable homicide charges.
Culpable homicide involves unintentional killing due to negligence or recklessness, as outlined in the Criminal Law (Codification and Reform) Act.
The company that owns the haulage truck had its licence cancelled pending investigations, reported The Herald.
According to Transport and Infrastructural Development Minister Felix Mhona, investigations revealed that the driver did not have relevant competency to drive public service vehicles, in line with the Road Traffic Act.
Responding to questions from journalists during Tuesday’s post-Cabinet briefing, Mhona said punishing the driver and cancelling the transport company’s operator’s licence will send a stern warning to drivers and operators of public service vehicles.
Home Affairs and Cultural Heritage Minister, Kazembe Kazembe, said his ministry will work with the Ministry of Transport to ensure that negligent drivers are brought to book and police officers manning roadblocks enforce the law. He said:
We are doing our utmost through the police to ensure that there is law enforcement. And not only that, we are working together with my counterpart, Minister Mhona, to leave no stone unturned in this regard.
For starters, we are going to be investigating every incident of an accident, starting with this particular one that has just happened.
We must ascertain the cause of the accident, whether it resulted from the driver’s poor decision-making, mechanical faults, or bus overloading.
Kazembe said the investigation will seek to establish if the vehicle passed through roadblocks and why it was not apprehended in the event it was overloaded. He added:
We are doing that as an intervention to ensure that we bring sanity to our roads. Secondly, we are also working together with my counterparts to ensure that we will equip our police officers to be able to carry out their mandate, to be able to account for those who are driving under the influence of alcohol and, you know, drugs and substances.
Ministers Mhona and Kazembe later issued a joint statement urging drivers to be cautious on the road during the Workers’ Day holiday this Wednesday.
The statement said police and the Vehicle Inspectorate Department (VID) will be out in full force throughout the Workers’ Day holiday to remove defective vehicles from the roads and enforce other relevant laws.
