Rwanda National Police statistics indicate that the accidents were mainly due to the high driving speed witnessed in weekends, irresponsible driving and drunk driving among other causes.
The revelations were made yesterday as Rwanda joined the rest of the continent to mark the ‘Africa Road Safety Day’ which was set aside to raise awareness on good road practices.
According to the IGP Dan Munyuza, 50% of the accidents involve commercial motorcyclists, cyclists and pedestrians and most accidents are recorded over the weekends, from Friday up to Sunday.”
IGP Dan Munyuza added: “We have conducted several awareness campaigns but still see accidents happening because of driving recklessly by some drivers. This is a concern of everyone, not just the Police. You don’t have to wait for an accident to happen to you, so, act.”
This year, over 106,835 vehicles underwent technical control tests and of them, 49,359 which were first tested were found in good conditions while 57,45 tested for the first time were found in bad conditions.
The Minister of State in charge of Transport, Eng. Jean de Dieu Uwihanganye said that ‘’At least two people lose their lives every day to road accidents. This has to stop. The new traffic law soon to be promulgated introduces stringent measures against abuse of traffic rules.”
“When people die in accidents, it’s not only the motorist or passenger who is affected; the country loses its human labor and spends more money to rehabilitate the destroyed public infrastructure instead of expanding such infrastructures or channeling the funds to other development activities,” Eng. Uwihanganye said while addressing thousands of people who attended Car Free Day at RRA ground in Kimihurura.
The new law provides steps through which a driver’s license can be withdrawn from an errant motorist, imprisonment for any motorist found drunk, high on illicit drugs and using a phone, but also penalties to a pedestrian whose inappropriate use of road result into accident or loss of lives,” he said.
Road accidents according to the World Health Organization (WHO), rank 8th among the leading causes of death globally with an estimated 1.2 million lives lost every day. Majority 60 percent of the accidents are in Sub-Saharan Africa.
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