Road Accident: I Wish Mine Were the Last
If it is true that there are 11,000 accident prone spots on Nigerian highways, then Nigerians should be wary and direct efforts towards identifying this spots and fixing them.Such a concerted effort to reduce the high rate of accidents on Nigerian roads as revealed by a transport management strategist Major ROA Salawu is vital. And […]
If it is true that there are 11,000 accident prone spots on Nigerian highways, then Nigerians should be wary and direct efforts towards identifying this spots and fixing them.
Such a concerted effort to reduce the high rate of accidents on Nigerian roads as revealed by a transport management strategist Major ROA Salawu is vital. And a recent publication by the African Technical Review says that Nigeria led 37 other countries in road accidents and fatality rates.
Similarly, out of the 38 countries studied on the basis of deaths per 10,000 vehicles, the United States of America was in the least (i.e. 38th position) with Nigeria beating Ethiopia and Malawi to the second and third places respectively while the rate of deaths from accidents in Nigeria was about 25 times that of both the United States and Great Britain.
Comprehensive analysis and concrete facts of the above revelations are contained in the 232 page book “ROAD ACCIDENTS: I WISH MINE WERE THE LAST” written by that prolific researcher, writer and humanist, Victor Olu Taiwo, himself a victim of three road accidents on Nigerian roads.
In the four chapter book, the author “who has been to heaven and back” and makes safety of life his prime concern after experiencing ghastly road accidents several times and survived believes that the reality of life is that one tragedy or the other will always befall human being till thy Kingdom come. And this is in tandem with the thought of Marcel Proust “We are healed of a suffering only by experiencing it in full”
“I was discharged the third day, having been given first aid treatment ostensibly to proceed to another hospital of my choice for the continuation of treatment as there was an influx of accident victims being brought in on daily basis as if it were a normal routine but with limited wards and beds to accommodate them”, Victor writes and adds that out of his concern for safety of life, he beckoned to the hospital attendants to bring somebody lying on the floor with his life obviously hanging in the balance to take his bed.
Victor, who is also the author of “Nigerian on Gun Powder: The Climax of Misrule” and “World Terrorism: Diagnosis and Path to Global Peace” blamed successive Nigerian governments for handling the safety of life especially on the nation’s highways with levity.
In Chapter Two of the book subtitled “Appreciating The Pace Setters”, the author knocked the bottom out of the controversy as to those who pioneered the establishment of the Road Safety in the country when he posited that “the tragedy of our era is that the nation is not interested in record and data collation, let alone appreciating our record breakers, pace setters, heroes and heroines” stressing that his investigation revealed that the most dreaded establishment by members of the public in the country was the Road Safety Corps of the old Oyo State under the tutelage and orientation of Major ROA Salawu (RTD) which, he said, derived from its high efficiency or activeness, honesty-inclination and incorruptibility as offering bribe to a “Majamaja” personnel as they were then called amounted to crime that attracted prompt sanctions.
“I had imputed the honour of establishing the commission to Bola Ige a former governor of Oyo State and Wole Soyinka respectively whom I erroneously regarded as the brains behind the founding of the Corps. And I should have qualified to be nailed on the cross had I so gotten the work to the print as a research writer but for my mechanic Niyi Giwa, who, ignorant of my involvement in the project of FRSC in a manner of divine spark, narrated in passing, the story of the founding of the commission linked to one Major Salawu, I argued vehemently against his position but he stood his ground out of conviction having claimed to be the mechanic’s position.”
The author noted that FRSC has proved good and unique among its peers in our national life that can be traced to its leadership especially the lodestar adopted by the masterminds of the establishment.
“Thus, one thing that is wonderful enough is that although it would be purely farcical to claim the insusceptibility of any Nigerian organ to the pandemic of corruption already institutionalized in the country, the immunity vaccine already injected into the system of FRSC at the inception must have been so strong indeed that the virus has the least effect on it which informs the lowest corruption index and the highest efficacy of functionally.”
The author identified six major factors of accident causation and the prophylaxis that can be employed to tackle the menace in the Nigerian situation as follows: Behavioral, Mechanical, Road/Environmental/ Institutional, Natural and Supernatural factors as well as important issues that are paramount in accident causation, all of which are detailed in the project for consideration and resolution by experts.