Progressive return to normal road and rail traffic

After a day's interruption, traffic resumed on the road linking Yaoundé to Douala, the two main towns in Cameroon, on 22 October 2016. The culvert that created the road collapse in the early hours of the morning on 21 October 2016, in the area of Manyaï, has been replaced with a temporary measure allowing vehicles to travel again between the two capitals. At the same time, we learn officially, a detour has been opened and should be improved in the coming days, with a view to completing final works on the damaged structure. Moreover, the government announces repair of all the culverts (more than 300) on this highway.

Rail travel has also resumed after the derailment that occurred on the same Friday 21 October 2016 in the area of Eséka, in the Centre Region of the country. According to Camrail, the Cameroonian train operator, whose Chairman gave a press briefing on 23 October 2016 in the evening, rail activity would restart from Saturday 22 October on the Yaoundé-Ngaoundéré line. On the Yaoundé-Douala line, affected by the derailment, only the train linking landlocked areas is back in service. As for the fast train between the two capitals, it will only be operational after the day of national mourning declared by the President of the Republic for this 24 October 2016, specified the Chairman of Camrail, Hamadou Sali.

Last week, the death toll of the Friday railway disaster, after the surge of passengers in the railway stations of Yaoundé and Douala following the announcement of suspension of road traffic between the two towns, rose. Official figures now number around 80 deaths and almost 600 injured referred to the main hospitals of Yaoundé and Douala.

The Cameroonian Head of State, who returned from a trip abroad in the evening of 23 October, has invited the population to a “uniting of hearts” in these sorrowful circumstances. “I have ordered an investigation, a thorough investigation to establish the underlying causes of these accidents or this tragedy. I have also ordered that hospital and other medical facilities receiving the injured treat them at the expense of the State”, indicated President Biya.