Innovative plans needed to reduce road accidents

 

The wreckage of a school bus that lost control and overturned in Kisii on July 10, 2013. Laxity and corruption have been blamed for the sharp rise in accidents as the death toll hit 1,731 in June. FILE  NATION MEDIA GROUP

By George Wachira

In Summary

• Authorities must accept carnage is a national disaster and urgently take steps to arrest the situation.

Recently, we were very impressed when the President intervened to sort out the perennial mess at the Mombasa port. A task oriented approach to sorting out the problem was adopted and timelines defined.

Previous failure to deliver an efficient port was mainly due to many players each with vested authority and interest which resulted in absence of a centralised approach to achieving efficiency.

Is it possible that a problem as serious as road accidents warrants similar attention and intervention? I think so. It all starts with the authorities acknowledging that killing and maiming of so many Kenyans on our roads is already a national disaster and that it is possible to address the situation.

Only then shall the road safety be prioritised by all players. Currently, it is only during “political” eulogising of victims at funeral rallies that high level officials acknowledge the problem. We saw this happen at the Kisii Stadium last week, and we saw it happen in Machakos a few years ago.

For many years now, Kenya has recorded more than 3,000 fatalities annually on our roads, which demonstrate a major problem that refuses to reduce.

With 1,731 deaths this half year we are certainly not doing any better. And this is despite a series of legal, regulatory and institutional reforms having already been implemented.

Last year, the government introduced new traffic laws, and as expected the police immediately responded with a flurry of highly publicised road safety campaigns.

But this euphoria lasted for only a short time. The police focused mainly on areas with least impact on accidents reduction. And it is said that a lot of money changed hands between the motorists and the enforcers.

Then came the police organisational reforms with new senior faces, but again a window of opportunity was lost to introduce renewed style and focus in traffic law enforcement.

Next came the private sector with a new fund to promote road safety awareness. The media campaigns had negligible incremental impact on road safety improvement.

Finally, the much awaited independent institution, the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA) with a specific road safety mandate was launched in April. The mandate for this authority indicates that it has wide enough scope to influence road safety, and perhaps this will happen when the authority is finally up and running.

The glaring missing link in the management of road safety has been the absence of effective enforcement by the police. Or more specifically a positive police culture that is driven by professionalism and devoid of corrupt practices.

The police have been hiding under the excuse of insufficient capacity and resources, but we all know that the real problem is absence of commitment to get out of the culture of corruption.

It is possible to have a well intentioned NTSA armed with good policies and regulations but at the end of the day it is the traffic police that will make it happen. And of course the motoring public who will need to adopt and sustainably nurture a culture that does not take risks with human lives.

It has been previously suggested that all players in the enactment of road safety pay a visit to Rwanda and learn the practices which make road safety enforcement in Rwanda orderly, effective and enviable.