One of the passengers who were injured when a Rimbi Travel and Tours bus which was racing behind a Zebra Kiss bus, was involved in an accident on 17 January 2023 in Mutoko District along the Harare-Nyamapanda Highway has accused the bus company’s management of being cold and unsympathetic for not rendering support to the injured.
The Rimbi bus, which was travelling to Harare with 23 passengers on board, rammed into the back of a Shacman Tipper which was travelling in the same direction.
Police said the bus driver was trying to overtake the truck whilst being blocked by a Zebra Kiss bus that was travelling in the same direction.
One person was killed, while seven others were seriously injured in the accident.
The woman, who was a passenger on the Rimbi bus, has expressed gratitude to the Zebra Kiss buses’ management for footing the hospital bills of the injured passengers. She said:
The Rimbi Tours bus driver was chasing the Zebra Kiss bus from border-Nyamapanda… I reprimanded him, if you heard someone who was reproaching the driver, it was I.
He said to me “woman, don’t bother me. I want him (the Zebra Kiss driver, to know that I’m capable of driving at great speeds.”
I implored him to slow down, and he then took his phone and handed it to the bus conductor, the one who died in the accident, he was close to me.
The Rimbi Tours management never came to see us when I was initially admitted at Mutoko Hospital and even here at Parirenyatwa Hospital, they didn’t come.
The Zebra Kiss management came to us here. They went to Mutoko Hospital and paid our hospital bills. They have also come to Parirenyatwa and they are assisting me.
I’m grateful for their love. I never imagined they would help me considering that I was injured aboard the Rimbi Tours bus, and not on their coach.
The Ministry of Transport and Infrastructural Development has since suspended the licences of Rimbi Travel and Zebra Kiss from operating all their omnibuses on all routes across the country.
The two buses companies were accused of violating sections of the Road Traffic Act which “prohibit driving without due care and attention or reasonable consideration for others, negligent or dangerous driving and reckless driving…”