IN WAKE OF REP. LAWRENCE RIA CRASH, MEDIA MUST HELP SHAPE PUBLIC SAFETY DEBATE

The Editor,

I just read the story about Rep. Lawrence’s death in a car accident. I couldn’t help thinking “there but for the grace of God go I.” I am up and down the Gbarnga-Monrovia highway weekly. I try not to travel it at night, but sometimes it’s just unavoidable. I wish Frontpage would launch an unrelenting campaign to shame the police and vehicle owners into taking public safety laws seriously.   Perhaps you could feature weekly photos of trucks without tail lights that show their license plates. Exposing some of them might get others to clean up their behavior.

Too many vehicles with lights and other elements that aren’t working, especially on trucks. Too many plowing our roads without license plates. It is sad to see those vehicles sail through checkpoints, together with vehicle that have no license plates, while other drivers get shaken down for “smuh sontin.” Perhaps a reporter/photographer could be posted at one of the “check points” to expose some of law-breaking vehicles that cruise through without being stopped for obvious defects. At checkpoints, why can’t police ask drivers to tap on their brakes to see if brake lights are working?

Can we as a nation, light a candle to dispel the darkness? Most of the major result of good journalism did not involve politics and national government.

They involved improving quality of life at the grassroots level. It’s not enough to critique officials, although is important. We must be willing to challenge bad patterns behaviors that have become entrenched in society.

If not, media consumers are reduced to spectators at a tennis match between government official and journalists. On this issue of traffic safety, the press has a chance to lead instead of waiting for government to act. As a consensus builds for action, government will find it hard to ignore public opinion. As long as the media are satisfied being the loudest voice in the public sphere, the public will remain spectators and government will do nothing.

Our media can do more to shape public opinion by building consensus for improvement. Improvement public safety is a good place to start. It’s not a UP, CDC or LP issue. It’s not a people outside government vs. people outside government issue. The deaths of Rep. Lawrence and Cyril Allen Jr. are just too cases to show that government officials are just as at risk as the rest of us. My two cents worth. Just me speaking truth from the margin of society to the powers that be in media circles.  I hope you can appreciate the irony of that.

Carl Patrick Burrowes, Ph. D.

Vice President for Academic Affairs

Cuttington University, Suakoko, Liberia. 

[email protected]