29 Students Killed in Exam Stampede After Transformer Explosion in Central African Republic
At least 29 students have died in a tragic stampede during high school exit exams in Bangui, the capital of the Central African Republic (CAR), after a power transformer exploded, triggering widespread panic, health authorities confirmed Thursday.
The incident occurred on Wednesday afternoon while more than 5,300 students were writing their second day of the national baccalaureate examination at the Barthelemy Boganda high school. Following the loud explosion, chaos erupted as students and exam supervisors scrambled to escape, with some leaping from the first floor of the school building.
Emergency responders rushed the injured to hospitals using ambulances, pickup trucks, and motorbike taxis, according to AFP correspondents at the scene. However, the influx of victims quickly overwhelmed local hospitals. “The hospital was so overcrowded that it hampered the work of caregivers and blocked ambulances,” a health ministry source said.
President Faustin-Archange Touadera, currently attending a global vaccine summit in Brussels, expressed deep condolences to the victims’ families and declared three days of national mourning. “I would like to express my solidarity and compassion to the parents of the deceased candidates, to the educational staff, to the students,” he said in a statement released via Facebook.
The country’s Education Minister, Aurelien-Simplice Kongbelet-Zingas, promised a swift investigation into the incident and said a new exam date would be announced soon.
UN peacekeepers and local security forces have been deployed around the school and hospitals, while the Republican Bloc for the Defense of the Constitution (BRDC), an opposition coalition, criticized the government for “failing in its duty to ensure student safety and school infrastructure.”
This tragedy comes amid heightened political tensions in CAR ahead of scheduled municipal, legislative, and presidential elections later this year. Though violence has eased in major cities, clashes between rebels and government forces—backed by Wagner mercenaries and Rwandan troops—persist in some rural regions.
The United Nations has urged institutional reforms and greater transparency from the country’s electoral authority as the nation prepares for critical polls.
