At least 29 children killed in Bukavu school fire as repeated blazes expose public safety failures under M23 rule

At least 29 children were killed in a school fire in Bukavu, the capital of South Kivu province in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, on Thursday. Dozens of other students and teachers were hospitalized after suffering suffocation and injuries in a stampede. The city, occupied since February 2025 by the Rwanda-backed AFC/M23 movement, is facing a string of fires that has exposed serious gaps in public safety and governance.

According to the UN-run Radio Okapi, the fire broke out at around 8 a.m. local time in the Chimpunda neighborhood before spreading to Ujamaa Primary School and Furaha Secondary School. South Kivu’s deputy governor, Dunia Masumbuko Bwenge, told Reuters that the schools and about 300 wooden homes had been destroyed.

AFP quoted local official Patrice Buduge as saying that the fire “then triggered a violent stampede, forcing pupils to trample one another or seek dangerous escape routes; many fainted and others lost consciousness.” Some died in the crush, he said. Buduge added that some victims died at the scene and others on the way to hospital.

Christophe Zigashane, a nurse at a local clinic, told AFP that his facility “received about 50 pupils, including several teachers, all suffering from severe asphyxiation.”

AFC/M23 spokesperson Lawrence Kanyuka said on Thursday that the confirmed student fatalities included 19 girls and five boys. He said 29 people were receiving treatment at local medical facilities, including 21 in intensive care. Seventeen seriously injured patients were at Kadutu General Hospital and four at Bukavu Provincial General Hospital. Kanyuka claimed M23 had deployed emergency teams to contain the blaze and assist those affected, and called for calm and unity while an investigation was underway.

Congolese local media reported that Bukavu had experienced several fires in recent days, including one last Sunday that destroyed more than 45 homes. Local officials and media outlets stressed that the death toll was provisional and that the cause of the fire had not been determined. Although the armed force controlling the city deployed emergency personnel to contain the flames, it has announced no systematic fire-prevention program or urban safety plan amid a series of blazes in which children have been the principal victims. Civilians are bearing the cost of this failure of governance.