Despite several road safety campaigns aimed at reducing carnage in Ghana, the country continues to record high cases of road accident leading to injuries and in some cases death of its victims.
Many have posited that the country's roads are not safe, terming them as "death traps".
The Director of Research, Education and Training at the Motor Transport and Traffic Directorate (MTTD), Supt. Alexander Obeng, in an exclusive interview with GhanaWeb as part of the Road Safety Campaign, has called for the dualization of major roads in the country.
He believes that such accidents occur “because we have allowed single carriages” on the country’s international roads. He has therefore charged authorities to find a long-lasting solution by way of converting single carriages into dual carriages.
He added that “It is one area that this country must pay much attention to now, in this present time.”
Supt. Alexander Obeng speaking on the back of the rise in road carnages intimated that “The solution lies in the fact that, the Safe System approach says that we should anticipate human error and ensure that such roads that are International that passes through this Republic (Accra-Paga and Aflao-Elubo), running it as single carriages have only become a death trap for us.”
According to statistics, the number of road accident recorded between January to March this year contributed to the death of 771 persons.
“When you look at the principle that is underlined in our road safety management, we seem to be off the track…if you are operating a road safety management system in any country that has its transport system not anticipating and accommodating human errors, it will be difficult to promote safety and this is what we are confronted with,” he said.
“Our safe system approach has failed. We are not keeping to the principle that has been documented and handed to member countries of the United Nation. We should get back to the basis… for how long shall we sit down without preventing head-on collision involving high occupancy buses?” he quizzed.
The GhanaWeb Road Safety Campaign forms a part of the numerous projects GhanaWeb has rolled out as part of its 22nd-anniversary celebrations.
The year-long campaign dubbed #GhanaWebRoadSafety took off on Monday, March 1, 2021, and will focus on three key areas: indiscipline on roads; bad roads, and potholes that contribute to road accidents and absence of streetlights.
The campaign is being executed in partnership with major stakeholders including the Ghana Road Safety Commission, the Motor Transport and Traffic Directorate of the Ghana Police Service, Ghana Highway Authority, the Korle Bu Teaching Hospital, the Ghana Fire Service, the Ghana National Ambulance Service and the Drivers and Vehicle Licensing Authority.
The campaign is also spearheaded by musician and politician Bice Osei Kuffour (Obour) as the Ambassador.
Join in the conversation by sharing your videos about indiscipline, bad roads and accidents on all our social media platforms; Instagram, Twitter and Facebook at @TheGhanaWeb and to our Whatsapp number: 0552699625
