Africanews
Every year thousands of Kenyans lose their lives in road accidents while thousands of others are left with injuries of varied degrees. What causes all these accidents and can anything be done to arrest the situation? |
The year begins today and four are killed in a road accident. The following day four more perish and the trend continues unabated until by the end of the year, the number of lives lost on Kenyan roads runs into thousands."Public service vehicle operators hold us at ransom every day. They cause most of the deaths and injuries on our roads due to careless driving," asserts Peter Kimani, a resident of Karuri, about 30km to the north of Nairobi. "They speed and overtake recklessly risking our lives."
"They abuse us daily, overcharge regularly and pack us like goods. These crooks have been known to throw people off moving vehicles if they complain about harassment."
According to a recent research by Dr. Sobbie Mulindi of the University of Nairobi, Kenya ranks seventh in global accidents, a revelation that is quite disturbing considering the fact that Kenya ranks nowhere among the countries with leading number of vehicles.
Among other things, Dr. Mulindi blames the chilling statistics on behavioural tendencies, corruption by law enforcers, poor roads and lack of serious commitment and political will to address the issues appropriately.
In Kenya, the mini buses (popularly known as matatus) and buses overload passengers especially in the urban areas. In the city of Nairobi, for instance, a 25-seat matatu carries an average of 40 passengers per any given trip. On many occasions it has been claimed that public transport vehicle owners handsomely reward their drivers for covering the distances between the city of Nairobi and Kisumu (340km to west) and Nairobi to Mombasa (380km to the east) in the shortest time possible. However, vehicle owners have vehemently clamoured at such allegations, dismissing them as mere malice.
Then there is the touchy issue of issuance of licenses to prospective drivers. This has been muddled with corruption that there have been cases of those with the backing of powerful patrons acquiring the licenses even before learning how to drive. The qualified drivers, on the other, find it extremely hard to get the same unless they oil the palms of the officers of charge.
The Director of the Motor Vehicle Inspection Unit, Mr. A. P. Mutwana, says that Kenyan roads have claimed 8,557 lives in the past three years, that is an average of eight lives per a day. Mr. Mutwana says that accidents are caused by drivers' , pedestrians', and cyclists' carelessness, recklessness, irresponsibility, lack of courtesy and failure to observe the highway code.
Mr. Mutwana identifies other causes of accidents in Kenya as defective vehicles, fatigue, bad weather, incompetent drivers, obstruction and police- motorist corruption.
The worst road accident in Kenya's history remains one which happened on December 7, 1992 when an overloaded bus plunged into Mikuyuni River, about 55km to the south of Nairobi, killing at least 106 people. The bus which belonged to Coast Bus Company was traveling from Nairobi to Kitui and was carrying at least 110 people. The scene of the horror accident was only 3 km from where another bus plunged into Thwaki River, killing 56 people in 1989.
Proposals that every Public Service Vehicle (PSV) be fitted with a speed governor have always seen PSV owners go on strike, forcing the government to back down in shame to avert a more serious crisis.
Such proposals usually come hot on heels of a major road accident
James Namude, a journalist with the East African Standard, Kenya's second leading daily attributes the accidents to apathy, indifference and the mind- your-own-business attitude that is the hallmark of many Kenyans' lifestyles especially those in the urban areas."While the response whenever a horror road accident occurs, arousing national outrage, has become more a predictable monotony of statements than outright deterrent action on the monstrous loss of lives, what is becoming increasingly certain is that Kenyans may have to start taking the initiative instead of solely relying on traffic police to act on road accidents," Namude says.
The journalist advises Kenyans to learn to refuse to board vehicles seen to be defective or driven recklessly as a possible panacea to this national malady. "They should know they have the power to make a citizen's arrest in public interest when evident cases of reckless driving is witnessed."
To Mungai Kihanya of Nakuru, about 200 km to the west of Nairobi, the major cause of road accidents in Kenya is traffic density and not speed. Kihanya notes that the number of cars in Kenya has been growing at about 10 per cent per year. "However, there is no corresponding expansion of roads. At this rate of increase in traffic density , the collision theory (the number of collisions per unit time) predicts that the number of accidents in 1996 will be 21 per cent higher than in 1995. That is 15,680 accidents and over 3,000 deaths.
"If the roads are not expanded, the traffic density will double in seven years. Therefore, in the year 2002, there will be four times as many accidents as there were in 1995, i.e. 51 840 and 10,470 accidents and deaths respectively."
After all is said and done, the fact remains that the rate at which Kenyans are dying in road accidents is alarming and the sooner the government seeks a lasting solution, the better.
USAGE/ACKNOWLED
Contents can be freely reproduced with acknowledgements. The by-line should read: author/AFRICANEWS.
Send a copy of the reproduced article to AFRICANEWS.AFRICANEWS - Koinonia Media Centre, P.O. Box 8034, Nairobi, Kenya
tel/fax: 254.2.560385 - e-mail: [email protected]
AFRICANEWS on line is by Enrico Marcandalli
PeaceLink 1996