Matugga Accident Kills 10

AT LEAST 10 people were killed yesterday, six of them from the same family, when a speeding taxi collided head-on with a Gateway bus at Matugga on the Kampala-Gulu highway.Wilsons Manyire and Geoffrey Kamali report that nine travellers died on the spot. One died on arrival at Mulago Hospital, the Police said. Some bodies had to be cut out of the mangled wreckage of the taxi. A total of 17 passengers were rushed to Mulago’s casualty ward, seven of them in critical condition. The accident occurred at a busy spot at lunch time as school children were crossing the road, sources said. The dead included Pastor Isaac Okello of the Chrisco Fellowship Churches, Entebbe, his wife Christine Okello and their four children, two of them girls.The other dead were the taxi driver, Patrick Serubidde of Entebbe, Robinah Nannozi and two unidentified men, one presumed to be the taxi conductor.The injured were Juliet Akitte, 16, Sukulu Difa, 16, Ismail Sentongo, 23, and Martin Obbo, 32. The rest could not be identified.“We are waiting for relatives to identify them,” the Kawempe traffic Police officer, John Maawa, said.The Police said the crash occurred when the taxi driver attempted to dodge a male pupil crossing the road at Mabanda. “He tried to avoid hitting the boy and lost control and hit the boy all the same. The coach was approaching at high speed. They collided. The bus overturned,” Maawa said.Dozens of wailing relatives flocked the city mortuary, looking for their loved ones. The mortuary was littered with mutilated bodies.Ends