Speaking from Tsumeb, the officer in charge of the investigation, Chief Inspector Jan Blaauw, said that police do in fact have the names of all the victims, but were still waiting for the families of seven to come in and identify their bodies.

He declined to release the names of those who had been positively identified, saying that police would release all the names simultaneously.

All the bodies have been taken to the Tsumeb mortuary for identification to take place from there.

Speaking to The Namibian yesterday, the loading master in Windhoek, David Lubinda, said that two of the passengers who died in the accident seem to have been picked up at Grootfontein, less than 20 kilometres from where the fateful incident would occur minutes later.

After the VW Microbus had left Grootfontein just after midnight, it was travelling in a northern direction en route to Mururani, near Rundu.

It passed through a police checkpoint, and would soon see the oncoming lights of a Namibia Defence Force recovery vehicle which had been towing a large cargo carrier.

What exactly happened when the vehicles passed one another is not known, but the microbus is suspected to have smashed into the cargo carrier, crushing the bus and horrendously ending the lives of all its occupants.

The two occupants in the cargo carrier survived the accident without injury.

Six of the passengers in the bus have been identified as Zimbabwean nationals, including a couple and their three minor children.

The names of the driver and co-driver, as well as six of their passengers have been established.

However, police have requested the names only be made public once all the casualties have been positively identified.

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