Muhanga fires leave two children dead

Two young children have died in three deadly fires which broke out between Thursday night and Friday morning in Muhanga District, Southern Province. A five-year-old girl died after she was seriously wounded in an early morning fire which gutted her family’s house in Nyabisindu Cell. The victim, who was identified as Mariam Uwase, had been rushed to Kigali University Teaching Hospital (CHUK) before she lost her life. The girl’s father, Shaban Simbandumwe, also sustained minor injuries on the arm as he attempted to rescue his little daughter from the fire. “The charred roof fell down, burying her,” said Aboubakar Mbarushimana who witnessed the incident. According to other eyewitnesses, fire broke out at Simbandumwe’s house on Friday morning shortly after 9 am, destroying all the occupants’ property. Residents tried to put out the fire using sand and water, sources near the gutted house said. In another incident, fire gutted a residential house in Rugarama village, Gifumba cell of Nyamabuye Sector and burnt a five-month-old-girl to death, the village leader Alexis Twagiramungu revealed. The cause of the fires is yet to be known but they broke out a few hours after another raging fire had destroyed commercial buildings in a busy trading area near Muhanga main market. Traders were left counting losses in millions as many of the shops destroyed in the market were not insured. Alice Nyiranteziryayo, a member of Imbangukiragutabara Security Company who was present when the fire broke out, spoke of huge flames of fire sweeping through the shops. She told Sunday Times that she was chatting with other guards when suddenly thick fumes emerged from one of the shops. “We immediately alerted the police and the owners of the shops,” she said. But fire spread quickly into the shops as if it was burning dried-out bushes thus complicating efforts to put it out, eyewitnesses said. “I have incurred a heavy loss. I do not know what to say,” a disheartened Clementine Dusabemariya who is the wife of one of the shop owners said. She revealed that her family has lost more than ten million Rwandan francs in the blaze. The Southern Region Police Spokesperson, Chief Superintendent Hubert Gashagaza, told Sunday Times that investigations are still ongoing to establish the cause of the fires. Gashagaza said that efforts to purchase fire fighting vehicles and post them upcountry should be faster to ease rescue efforts. The Southern Province has seen a string of fire incidents in the last few days, with blazes also destroying a number of equipment at Kinazi Hospital, Ruhango District on Thursday, and at Ruhango-based school, Byimana School of Sciences, last week. The fires gutted the school for the third time in less than one and a half month.