POLICE last week held a Heroes and Defence Forces holiday road safety awareness campaign to educate motorists and the commuting public ahead of the “long weekend” holidays.
The campaign, led by Officer Commanding Harare Province, Commissioner Maxwell Chikunguru, and Chief Staff Officer (Press and Public Relations), Commissioner Paul Nyathi, drew participants from the Traffic Safety Council of Zimbabwe, transport associations, Vehicle Inspectorate Department (VID), City of Harare and bus operators.
It was not the first awareness campaign undertaken before national holidays to avert road traffic accidents.
Awareness campaigns have become a ritual.
Yet, road traffic accidents continue to occur unabated, most of them a result of human error and a blatant disregard for traffic rules.
Such awareness campaigns have not reaped the intended results.
Year in, year out, motorists and passenger service vehicle crews are told to respect road rules, keep defective vehicles off the country’s roads.
The police have declared war on motorists violating road rules, mounting roadblocks, while VID threatened to impound unroadworthy vehicles.
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However, the story is the same after every holiday as families mourn members lost to road traffic accidents.
Precious lives would have been lost, leaving families grieving. A family would have lost a breadwinner — mother, father, brother or sister.
The blame lies with stakeholders, namely police and VID, public service vehicle operators, drivers and passengers.
Vehicles that are fit for scrap metal continue to drive on our roads despite the police and VID mounting roadblocks to flush out unfit vehicles.
It means the drivers of these vehicles are greasing the palms of officials.
Passengers have a right to call out drivers when they violate road rules.
Some passengers cheer on drivers to speed so that they reach their destinations in time. However, as the Swahili proverb states, “hurry, hurry has no blessings”, they become the statistics of road traffic accidents.
For how long will we continue to have this mindset?
There is a need for a mindset shift by all — police, VID, public service vehicle crews, motorists and passengers.
Once passengers start calling out rogue drivers, there will be a big difference.
Why should police and VID officers grant free passage to an unfit vehicle?
The moment they decline bribes and arrest the motorist, there will be a marked difference.
Accepting bribes from such motorists means the police and VID officials are complicity in the event that the vehicles are involved in an accident.
We cannot continue counting dead bodies during the holidays. The law must be applied without fear or favour to punish the rogues who have invaded the country’s roads.
Road traffic accidents can be tamed. What is required is the realisation that the “see no evil, hear no evil and speak no evil” attitude will not rid country’s roads of accidents.
One does not need to pay a bribe to get safe passage at roadblocks. Unfit vehicles must be impounded.
We yearn for an era where police officers arrest motorists attempting to bribe them at roadblocks.
Leave sooner, drive slower, live longer, this safety slogan must be the guiding principle of all motorists.
