Why the war against road carnage in Kenya is off the track

The public authorities concerned promised to once again deploy the NTSA at roadblocks, together with the traffic police to curtail the road carnage.

In 2023, data released by the NTSA indicated the number of those who lost their lives during a similar period at 959.

A report released early this year by the NTSA indicated that a cumulative 22,885 people were involved in road accidents in 2023.

Data from the 2023 Kenya economic survey indicates that 4,690 deaths were reported on our roads in 2022 as compared to 4,579 in 2021.

KENYA’S PATTERN MIRRORS MIDDLE INCOME COUNTRIES

Worldwide, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), around 1.35 million people die on the roads each year, while as many as over 50 million suffer injuries.

Countries that are in the range of low to middle income bear over 90 per cent of these gruesome statistics and yet possess only 60% of vehicles globally.

Kenya being among the middle-income countries has seen road traffic accidents place a huge strain on its national health system which suffers woeful inadequate levels of resources and capacity as witnessed currently.

NTSA’S UNDERWHELMING PERFORMANCE

Locally, the road and transport sector is regulated by the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA). NTSA states that its objective is “to harmonize the operations of the key road transport departments and help in effectively managing the road transport sub-sector and minimizing loss of lives through road crashes.”

However, the reality on the roads is that the NTSA is yet to catch up and having been given the mandate to ensure safety on our roads, one would be left wondering how, in retrospect to the rich body of research relevant to the sector, they have accrued many safety and policy misses to the detriment of safety on Kenyan roads. Indeed, Road and Transport public officials claim that missing signposts and road marks, careless driving and narrow bridges along the highways are the major causes of the carnages.

CORRUPTION CLOGGING NTSA STRATEGY

According to the draft National Road Safety Action Plan 2023-2027, the primary aim of the policy paper is for the NTSA to use a combination of efforts to bring down to half the number of fatalities witnessed now from RTAs and also achieve the collection of clean and accurate data concerning all accidents within the country to aid in planning.

It mentions very clearly the higher incidence of motorcyclists locally which has overtaken pedestrians by 38% to 35%.

In the draft strategy paper, NTSA seeks to amplify collaboration with the National Police Service (NPS), the Ministry of Health (MoH), all roads authority bodies, the Kenya Bureau of Standards (KEBS) and the National and County governments. All this is good, but the last time the NTSA collaborated closely with the Kenya Police it was the cost of bribery on the highways that went high and not safety.

The most recent report by the Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission listed the NTSA as the agency receiving the largest share of bribes at 33.6 per cent. It was also found to be the public institution where the service seekers paid some of the highest bribes at an average of Ksh. 81, 801.

All this happening in a country where over 60 per cent of citizens are dissatisfied with the level of integrity and transparency of public services.

The National Road Safety Action Plan 2023-2027 might be very well written and intentioned but the ogre of corruption still lurks in those corridors, and it might be just another very good paper that is un-implementable.

NTSA JUSTIFYING ITS EXISTENCE

Whenever NTSA has come out to say it seeks to pursue certain specific measures to enhance road safety, it has been more of a move towards collecting more revenue from the public under the guise of enhancing safety on the roads.

The current push to ensure all cars running in the country have the new look number plates is most accurately a census on the number of serviceable motor vehicles in the country with very little to show for safety. To have embedded a smart computer chip within the new-look registration plates would have gone a long way towards enhancing safety and security.

Many will also recall the recent push by the NTSA towards compelling all motor vehicles to undergo mandatory bi-annual inspection checks yet it is unable to cater for the annual inspection checks needed by commercial vehicles. This is baffling.

They have tried to explain it away by saying they will contract private garages to undertake the same at a fee. This will ultimately lead to the elephant in the room for safety, and corruption! Many cars will receive their clean inspection certificates without stepping into any garage.

NTSA SHOULD THINK BEYOND VEHICLES

In tackling accidents, historically, the majority of measures put in place are to help reduce road traffic deaths and injuries of the vehicle occupants.

However, a very big proportion of those killed or injured in road accidents are pedestrians and motorcyclists.

Hence, notable resources should be spent on these affected groups towards designing roads, educating and undertaking preventive safety measures.

INADEQUATE ENFORCEMENT OF TRAFFIC LAWS

If traffic laws based on human flaws and anomalies are not enforced or are perceived as not being enforced, it is likely they will not be complied with and therefore will have very little chance of influencing behavior.

Effective enforcement includes establishing, regularly updating, and enforcing laws at the national and county levels that address many risk factors. It includes also the definition of appropriate penalties.

THE AGONY OF ACCIDENTS

Accidents resulting in fatalities are being reported by the media so regularly that there is a fear many will lose sensitivity to the fact that these are dear lives lost, never to be seen again. These accidents have claimed the lives of otherwise fit and healthy Kenyans going about their day-to-day activities.

Deaths and injuries from road accidents cause considerable economic losses to productive individuals, their families, and the nation as a whole. These losses arise from the death of productive people, the cost of treatment, those disabled by their injuries, and family members who need to take time off work or school to care for the injured.

It is estimated that road accidents cost most countries 3% of their gross domestic product. The Ethics and Anti-Corruption Commission (EACC) recently singled out corruption in traffic management as the main cause of traffic laws violations which have led to the increasing deaths of passengers from road accidents.

On social media platforms, time after time, exasperated citizens are posting vehicles, flouting traffic rules with abandon. NTSA and NPS react when they are tagged with the usual “We shall catch up with them!”

NPS and NTSA cannot go on with business as usual and Kenyans expect a different outcome. Unless the dragon of corruption, endemic in these two institutions, is tackled decisively, twenty years from now Kenyans will still be wondering how to deal with safety on our roads.

Kenyans should also know that to be human carries with it a lot of responsibility and not just rights. As citizens, we should appreciate that even though ethical behaviour and civility are core human concerns that we are out of touch with, we need to claw back for the sake of our safety, sanity and future. Remember… human behaviour cannot be regulated or controlled by law.

Let us be human, to be human is to care for ourselves and others in all our endeavours. Hence when we are on the road, do as one driving instructor used to advise his protégées… assume that you are the only sane person on the road and do the right thing, exercise patience but do not die right!