{Members of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs, Cooperation and Security, visited Rwanda National Police at its headquarters in Kacyiru on April 1, to assess the force’s response to road carnage and the security of borders.}
They were received by the Inspector General of Police, Emmanuel K. Gasana, who briefed them on various initiatives undertaken to improve road safety and security.
Majority road accidents are said to be caused by carelessness, over speeding, overloading, overtaking in sharpe corners or hotspots, among others.
In a presentation, the lawmakers were taken through initiatives taken to further improve security on roads such as conducting periodic awareness among road users, especially drivers, identifying and mapping hotspots on highways, increasing police visibility on roads and targeted areas as well as acquiring hi-tech gadgets like the Advanced Speed Laiser’ used to measure the speed of cars.
The Advanced Speed Laiser machine has the capacity to measure speed, video recording, and identify vehicles registration number unlike the previous one which could only indicate the speed. A number of traffic officers have since been trained on how to use these new gadgets.
Other initiatives include ensuring compulsory mechanical inspection of vehicles and decentralizing the inspection centre in regions and, easing the process of acquiring driver’s licence.
Jeanne d’Arc Mukakalisa, the vice President of the committee of senators said: “The role of Police is to ensure security of people and their property, and we were given a depth explanation on how this is done to ensure road safety and security.”
A joint meeting of various ministries, late last year, adopted multiple measures to prevent road accidents. They include applying maximum penalties to violators, tough penalties to anyone caught speaking on phone while driving, establishing roadside resting stations for heavy trucks and long range drivers and scaling up the issuance of vocational cards to drivers of public service vehicles to regulate their performance , which has succeeded in the City of Kigali as well as monitoring hours of operations of drivers.
Others include establishing humps and erecting signposts in hotspots, enforcing technical control of vehicles and installing speed governors in commercial vehicles, public and heavy trucks, increasing deployment of Police facilities and traffic officers on highways, conducting awareness campaigns on road safety and scaling up disaster response services in regions.
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