Monrovia – Traffic and Road Safety Network of Liberia(TARSNOL), a media advocacy group has slammed the “alarming wave of fatal motor accidents” which it blames as being responsible for the death and injuries of valuable citizens in Liberia.
“The news about accident deaths have now reach National Public Health Crisis proportion and deserves national attention of every stakeholders who mean well for the healthy existence of every human species in the territorial confines of Liberia,” TARSNOL Chief Executive Officer Abraham Wheon said in a press conference held on Wednesday, September 10 in Paynesville.
“In 2019, the Liberia National Police Reported 40 accident deaths in 10 months just on the Monrovia- Gbarnga road while with just eight months in 2020 the death toll keep climbing with several of these accidents leading to deaths occurring on major highways as a result of no speed limits enforcement.”
Wheon said the number of accident related deaths in Liberia are very ‘much scaring’ as any health pandemics that threatens public health and safety.
Similarly, he maintained that crashes leading to severe injuries in the urban areas, where commuters and vehicles as well as motorbikes compete for road usage, account for the most life-threatening situations.
Mr. Wheon further noted that Public officials’ violations of traffic regulations have caused ordinary citizens to also join in violations, thereby putting the vulnerable road users’ lives at serious risk.
At the same time, Wheon stated that the streets of Liberia have become unsafe on a daily basis, a situation he said has left vulnerable road users deeply worried about their safety in the streets.
He commended the House of Representative for citing Police Inspector General Patrick Sudue and Transport Minister Samuel A. Wlue on August 13; over the increase in road accident cases across the country and the low presence of police in rural Liberia, but stressed that the action is belated, urging that body to go beyond just summoning them.
“Tarsnol reminds members of that augur body that this action was most needed when one of their own colleague Representative Adolph Lawrence died in a fatal motor vehicle crash as a result of an abandoned truck parked on a major international highway and also when school-going children packed in a bus sustained serious injuries and some died in a car crash on the Monrovia- Gbarnga highway,” he stressed.
“Just fortnight ago, one of your late former colleagues from Gbapolu county who has been buried; the District #2 Representative Malai G. Gbogar was on Tuesday evening August 11,2020 killed after a speeding car ran into her while sitting near her home in Gaye Town Old Road playing ludo.”
He termed as regretful, for officials of government to carried out traffic violations, while duty police officers on the other hand, are called by higher-ups to release relatives and friends who are caught breaching traffic regulations.
He added: “In fact in 2018, members of the National Legislature knowing the achy nature of our vehicle and traffic laws and despite international interest in the admen decided to selfishly drat an act granting unto themselves rights to use the opposite lane to the detriment of vulnerable road users.”
TARSNOL CEO believes that this ‘partial amendment’ only demonstrates how lawmakers put their interest above citizens who are their direct employers.
TARSNOL reminded officials of the government that the private sector is their retirement area and, therefore making laws and behaving in a manner that negatively affects those in the private sector “amounts to “abuse of national servants and product of bad governance.”
Wheon described as a shock, the police report on the usage of the opposite lane, from January to July 2020, detailing 12 cases registered in court, 41 persons injured, a number of properties damaged amounting to 29 and two deaths.
Therefore, he is calling for the amendment of the vehicle and traffic laws.
He wants the Ministry of Transport to not only focus on mainly attributed to the existence of defective vehicles, the ministry will only focus on collecting revenue through the process of vehicle registration and licensing, but to put general welfare of citizens first, by removing defective vehicles from the streets.
“There are lots of defective vehicles in the streets posing danger day by day and those vehicles are qualified as roadworthy owing to the fact that the Ministry issues them valid license plates,” Wheon maintained.
“In as much the Ministry would not issue an insane person driver’s license or revoke the license of a driver who breaches traffic laws, the same should apply to vehicles that pose serious death trap to road users.”
He believes revenue generation will be of no essence when citizens who suppose to be beneficiary are losing their lives daily from vehicle pollution.
Mr. Wheon is calling on the Ministry of Transport to work with relevant stakeholders for vehicles roadworthy inspection before preceding with vehicle registration.
In the same way TARSNOL informed the government that the supply of electricity along the street is equally important as done at home. “Nowadays, the cities are dark thus eroding night time beautification of the city and posing a serious risk
