Small boy dies in Nicaragua after falling through hole in floor of bus he was traveling in

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – The child, traveling with his grandmother, was about to occupy a seat next to the bus window, without seeing that in the space to put his feet there was a hole, which he sank through. There was no time to ask the driver to stop, according to what witnesses told journalists.

The incident occurred on the road in eastern Managua, in front of the headquarters of the Ministry of Health (Minsa). The child’s grandmother, Gregoria Polanco, suffered a nervous shock and was attended to on the street by Minsa personnel, authorities said.

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The bus, donated by Russia in the last decade to modernize Managua’s urban public transport fleet, belongs to a route used by students from four of Nicaragua’s largest universities.

The news aroused indignation in Nicaragua, as bus breakdowns are a daily occurrence. The National Police announced that it would investigate the case.

Most of the collective urban transport buses circulating in Managua have their origin in different donations that Russia sent to Nicaragua between 2007 and 2013, and others purchased from Mexico.

According to data disclosed at the time by the Government of Nicaragua, in the first six years of the Ortega Government, from 2007 to 2013, Russia sent to Nicaragua 520 buses to renew the fleet of collective urban transport and 520 cars to be used as cabs.

The Government of Nicaragua announced the donation of 300 new buses by Russia last October. In March, it communicated the contribution of 250 more but then did not inform if they finally arrived.

Before the arrival of the Russian buses, Managua’s fleet of some 850 buses was composed almost entirely of school buses discarded in developed countries.