Rumours

I started to notice the prevalence of rumours in Bukavu around la journée de la ville mort, a day when everyone stays home so the streets are dead so to speak, which took place here in February to recognize ongoing political oppression. I received vastly different accounts of what was going on depending who I talked to ranging from one quiet day (which was what actually happened) to three days of intense protest with the possibility of violent clashes between protest groups. 
On Saturday morning I was naturally distressed to learn that an explosion had occurred in a vehicle close to a central market right along the main road in town which killed three people. However, there was evidence of rumours in the very first retelling of the story I heard which led me to check the news before sharing the information myself (it was of course confirmed). The first person who told me about the incident told me that a widow and her three children had been killed in an explosion in their vehicle which was caused by a grenade that was thrown at a car by the family of the widow's deceased husband who killed her husband years ago and now had returned to finish the job. Another informant told me that it was a dispute between neighbours which led to the grenade being thrown into the car. The two most far out stories came from other foreigners, one who told me that a grenade had been thrown at a crowd that had gathered to protest the financial mismanagement of a cooperative bank, and another who told me that a refrigerator exploded in the back of the vehicle. More recently I've heard lots of my local contacts speculate that the explosion was caused by witch craft, one going as far as to say that there was no trauma on either of the bodies (unfortunately someone posted pictures of the bodies on facebook so I can confirm that there was in fact trauma to the bodies). 
All that has been confirmed by at least two independent news sources (Radio Okapi and Radio France International) is that an explosion which was the result of an attack occurred in a vehicle which caused the death of a mother and her two children and that police are investigating. It's not even clear if it was a grenade or a car bomb.
I find the pervasiveness of rumours in the spread of information here very interesting. It likely results from the absence of a reliable source of security information, lack of access to formal news sources (many people can't read and don't have access to a radio or television) and to a large extent fear. A lot of the people who I'm working with have recently expressed fear over the possibility of violence and war surrounding the election. Although none of the rumours I've heard have linked the attack to terrorism or armed groups, after recounting the stories each of my informants have concluded that "it wasn't an attack by an armed group" and I wonder if it's a reflection of what it would mean for them and their community it was in fact an attack, since indeed we have no information other than that three people were killed when something exploded in their vehicle.