South African road fatalities – when will it all stop?
When will it all stop?
Chris Barry, Managing Director, Heavy Commercial Vehicle Underwriting Managers
With long weekends and holidays coming up, road safety is a hot topic of conversation. Every year we get stats and facts on road fatalities, but never formulate concrete plans to decrease them. Thousands if not millions of Rands are spent on road safety c
What urged me specifically to write this, is the recent tragedy where 24 victims died in a bus accident in the Western Cape. And something that caught my attention was President Jacob Zuma’s remark that he was shocked by the incident. Shock is something that indicates “surprise”. Currently there is an average of 41 road fatalities a day, which means these fatalities, with all respect to these victims, is half the daily “quota”.
Of course an accident of this magnitude is horrifying, but the reality is that it is an everyday occurrence, as we can see by the fatality statistics.
The Transport Minister called for a “speedy investigation” into the incident, however this tragedy is in the past, so what use is another investigation if it will not lead to substantial solutions? Mr. Minister your department has been consulted and informed numerous times by extremely competent transport experts that have indicated solutions to reverse the shocking statistics of road fatalities in South Africa which approximate a staggering 15,000 a year.
There are however positive steps that could be taken to stop future carnage, these include the following:
1. As Mandi Smallhorne stated in an article in 2012 it is vital to bring back personal infringement notices. For example, a law enforcement officer stopping and fining a motorist for an infringement has more impact on the motorist than receiving another photo of a speed infringement.
2. In a debate recently, an Australian exchange student commented that South African motorists and road users use the Rules of the Road as “guidelines”, in other words they do not see the Law as the Law (as in Australia).
3. Only the ethical corporates and citizens with consciences are compliant with roadworthiness and discipline because they embrace it themselves. There needs to be a partnership between Government and the best practices set by the Private Sector to take over all the roadworthy centres with the aim to reduce the level of corruption which currently governs our roads.
4. Road safety should become an integral part of education in schools.
5. The government allowed the State Driver Training Facilities to collapse. Proper best practice needs to be embraced with proper incentives for driver training.
6. Brake failure in commercial vehicles is normally a euphemism to dilute the real reason for the accident, which is speed. The reference to a hairpin bend and the bus going through an arrester bed implies exactly this. Please note this is no personal dismissal or blame on the driver of this tragedy. I am sick and tired of the political grandstanding which masks how little government is doing to attack the root causes of the scourge. Government is not alone; South Africans in general need to apply a lot of introspection. On this point, my understanding is that there has been no conviction for the shocking state that the bus was in in the Knysna bus tragedy, 2011.
7. To be effective, arrester beds have to be maintained. If they are it is unlikely that a coach would “go straight through it”. A well respected transport journalist, Patrick O’ Leary calls it “a war out there”. A war on getting the authorities to take action.
I agree, Mr. President, I also find this shocking, but there are two issues to the “shock”:
1. The government’s real effort in enforcing matters in transport that it controls is pathetic.
2. The denial of how strong some private sector companies are in respect of ethics and how Public/Private partnerships could start to change the tide.
It is imperative that both road users and government take action in order to decrease the statistic before the tragedies become mundane.
