Govt should include road safety on the insecurity agenda
In January this year, I fractured my left leg after a fall… Six days later after surgery, I was discharged to continue with recovery from home.
I began a journey I did not expect and was totally unprepared for, but one I had to undertake. As I rode back home that evening, I seemed to see boda boda riders and passengers with a new point of view.
Perhaps I already had this view point, but the clarity was finally at its best or at least several pixels better.
I kept looking at the riders and passengers and thinking to myself: “Oh my goodness!” This is what Ugandans are going through unknown numbers everyday. I thought of the pain and cost of medical care. I thought of the immobility, I thought of how I would need to explain to my employees that I would need to work from home for a month”.
A member of Parliament with a passion for road safety reminded me that unlike many others suffering injury, I was lucky to have a job that would largely allow me to work from home and employees that would be able to support me through this time. Together, we thought of the small business owner, the farmer, the vendor, etc. If they survived as I did, then they must do so under the most difficult circumstances.
Last week, as my lane was released by the traffic officers managing traffic at the Kitgum House traffic light junction, there were at least 20 boda boda riders that continued to cross the junction from all directions. We seemed to be surrounded or ambushed by the riders despite the clear direction given by the traffic officers.
Like many others, I simply looked on. What I will never forget is the expression of extreme apprehension on the face of a young woman perched on a boda boda that narrowly escaped collision with three other boda bodas. While the rider wore a helmet, she did not.
The following day, while waiting for the lights to turn green near the Electoral Commission offices, I saw a woman stop a boda boda rider. But as she got onto the motorcycle she made the sign of the Cross. It is possible that she was praying for journey mercies. The following day President Museveni was due to address Parliament on the state of security/insecurity in the country. One definition of insecurity is as follows - a state of being open to danger or threat or lack of protection.
Ugandans welcomed the address and several expectations were communicated over various media channels. The issue of investigations came up with a specific concern for boda boda activities as an assurance on safety.
Ugandans want to be safe, they want government to ensure their safety and where it is lacking, to acknowledge and put the necessary measures, checks and controls in place to change the status quo. The oldest and simplest justification for existence of government is to protect citizens from violence and to ensure people’s social and economic welfare.
WHO believes that these two areas of concern belong together and are further categorised as follows - injuries can be unintentional - resulting from incidents such as traffic collisions, drowning and falls or intentional following an assault or self-inflicted violence or resulting from war.
Injuries kill more than five million people worldwide each year and harm many millions more. Yet events that result in injury are not random or unpredictable. Further It is food for thought that where the WHO is concerned with the growing rate of injuries and fatalities, deliberate or unintentional, they highlight road traffic collisions as unintentional. We ponder on what terminology best fits, especially when taking into consideration the varied levels of education, sensitisation, implementation of policies, and enforcement of laws and regulations from one county to the another.
Why should specifically road traffic fatalities and injuries fall under the unintentional category? I suppose, like our learned friends, one may focus on proof of intent. For many reasons, I do see the unintentional argument, but the line remains gray. Many times, the facts following a crash, point to several causes all “unintentional”, but leading to one tragic incident. But is there such a thing as collective intention? That said, the discord and following discussion on insecurity cannot and should not exclude road safety.
As Uganda begins to implement the ‘Road safety Legislative Action Plan’, an initiative with the support of the World Bank’s Global Road Safety Facility, the Ministry of Works and Transport, implemented by the Parliament of Uganda and Safe Way Right Way, it is imperative that when Ugandans go about their economic and social activity, they should not feel an acute sense of being open to danger or threat of lack of protection or at worst, actually experience injury and loss of life.
Ms Mwanje is the chief executive officer
Safe Way Right Way.
