Is that car too expensive? Not if it will save your life!

Eastern Uganda. Going to the tiny, jumbled and dry, windswept excuse of a town that Butaleja is, you have to cross the railway four times, if you make a north-easterly approach along that murrum road from Namutumba Township.

There were days when trains were part and parcel of the daily life of Ugandans; but that was until the National Resistance Movement (NRM) shot its way to power in 1986. 

NRM may know how to win gun battles, but the chaps are absolutely clueless when it comes to managing economies sustainably. The trains got less and less, till even the railway lines disappeared in most of Uganda.

Trains, quite literally, turn up once in a blue moon nowadays, especially in the villages. I was, therefore, caught off-guard, as I drove to Butaleja Magistrate’s Court, five years ago; my wife in tow. 

As a careful driver, I still stop at each railway crossing, just in case. I did that for the first three crossings; but just then, the phone rang. It was a clerk from the court advising that the magistrate, His Worship Ronnie Nsobya was in court and I better be quick.

I increased my speed to about 100km per hour. Having crossed the first three railway points without incident, the human side of me persuaded me that the fourth crossing would be safe. Because of the maize and banana gardens all over the place, I couldn’t get a broad view of the crossing.

I approached at full speed…not knowing I was rushing into the waiting arms of death. 

Surprise, surprise, there was a goods train coming, on its way to Tororo! I didn’t see it, because of the obstruction by the vegetation. Fortunately for me, the train driver saw a complete idiot approaching, and sounded the horn.

I immediately recognised the danger we were in; and braked. The Mercedes ML responded to the urgency in my foot and stopped, effortlessly… a metre from the railway line. The huge, long train rolled by, harmlessly.

For a car at high speed, on a loose surface-road, to stop within a second or two of asking, it has to be really, really special. Interestingly, when I was buying the car, my wife had vehemently opposed me: an expensive car when we needed money to build a perimeter wall around our home didn’t go down well with her. It’s the only time in our family history that I ever dared overrule my wife.

I am glad I did; for a lesser car would, in all likelihood, have gotten both of us killed and left six children with neither father nor mother. 

Last week, when I narrated our narrow escape to my doctor friend, Esau, he had an even better story to share. He, quite unlawfully and ill-advisedly, overtook in a bend on a Kampala road, a few years ago, only to find himself on a collision course with a taxi (Toyota Hiace), which, it turned out, had only driver and conductor on board. Angry that some lunatic was in his way, the driver (who had time and space to avoid the collision) increased his speed as he told his conductor, “Let me hit this fool and show him!” 

A huge bang as metal crashed into metal at top speed, followed by the unmistakable breaking of glass and cries of agony, told the tale of an almighty crash! All three men were rushed to Mulago hospital. It is the conductor, on a stretcher, as he was wheeled to the emergency ward who told the story of what transpired, as he blamed his driver – who had been killed on impact. 

The conductor, seriously injured, did several weeks in hospital. Esau, on his part, was declared as fit as a fiddle, given a bottle of fresh juice and he walked away to Café Javas, Kamwokya, where he ordered chips and chicken wings. His car, a Mark X, was written off; but in spite of it being a highly-priced car, he bought another Mark X, acknowledging that had he been in a weaker machine, he’d be dead meat by now. 

In a country with one of the worst road accident rates in the world, be wise: paying a little more is nothing. A car cannot be too expensive, if it will save your life…and you never know when that crucial moment will turn up.

Mr Gawaya Tegulle is an advocate of the High Court of Uganda     
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