ANOTHER CAMPAIGN IS IN THE MAKING!

Nov 02, 2010 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

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Following some horrific road accidents this past week, it is predictable, definitely certain that the police will be out on Corentyne Public Road and other thoroughfares with their radars, pulling over motorists for speeding  and either issuing them with tickets or better yet hauling them before the Courts.
Every time there is a major traffic accident involving multiple fatalities, this is the routine that follows. A short campaign, a few charges here and there, and then life returns to normal.
This time it may be different. The President himself will become involved. According to reports in the media, the head of the country will be meeting with the road safety council, no doubt to discuss ways and means in which our roads can be made safe.
The roads are not the problem. If these roads could have spoken they would reveal the terrors that they witness each day from speeding vehicles. They would express their utter frustration at how minibuses stop on our roadways.
They would explain their astonishment that passengers sit quietly in speeding vehicles and refuse to caution the drivers to slow down even though the passengers’ lives are at risk, and further more they are the ones paying for the drop.
They will tell you about the new habit of vehicles running the traffic lights or about buses diverting from the established routes so as to avoid having to encounter traffic lights. They will caution also about the number of beggars that are assembling near junctions soliciting alms, and in the process placing their life in jeopardy.
The roads are not the problem and therefore speeding and other forms of reckless use of the roads will continue to take lives.  But what is required is for passengers to recognize the dangers that they face on the road.
I am sure that when Kaieteur News took the decision to publish those grizzly images of scenes of the recent accident in Berbice that took the lives of those twelve persons, they must have considered long and hard before making such a judgment.
They must have known that there would be persons who would be critical of that decision. But they were right, because passengers in Guyana are simply not being responsible. They are deliberately placing their lives at risk when they travel in speeding vehicles.
This is no pre-judgment on what happened in the accident on the No. 19 Public Road. The police will eventually piece the evidence together and they will know who was at fault. But it is a fact in this country that passengers sit in vehicles and allow the drivers to proceed at a fast pace. Certainly they cannot be oblivious to the dangers involved.
If the passengers are not going to speak up, then the authorities need to do something. The wrong approach, however, is to loose the traffic department on motorists. There are some traffic ranks whose fingers must be ticking, knowing that a campaign is imminent. Loosing traffic ranks in another campaign will only encourage greater corruption.
What is needed is a long term plan for traffic in Guyana. This will be the subject of my column next week, but for the time being, let me state without reservation that it is inexcusable for a country with so many vehicles and with a vastly improved road infrastructure, to have so very few speed limit signs on some of the major public roadways.
At least if there is anything which can be done to help deal with the problems on our road, it is for speed signs to be erected. These signs will serve as a reminder that there are speed limits for particular routes.
It will also help reduce corruption, because one of the practices of many police ranks is entrapment. There are many areas in Guyana in which motorists are totally unaware of the speed limits on public roads, and the police usually pick the areas where the speed limit is reduced and they conceal themselves and then pounce on motorists.
In England there are radars on the roadway and there are also signs that indicate the speed limit. Motorists therefore have the kinds of reminders – regular signs that indicate the speed limits and radars – which can make a driver aware that he or she needs to slow down so as to not to get a ticket.
There are signs also telling you that you are approaching a radar. The purpose is not to have you charged but to encourage you to voluntarily slow down.
The installation of speed radars on our roads will encourage drivers to reduce their speed passing through the areas where the radars are located. Guyana cannot afford not to have these radars.
Too many lives are being lost on the road. If the technology is there it should be used, rather than having traffic ranks concealing themselves and pouncing on unsuspecting motorists. Otherwise Guyana is going to pay with the loss of lives, as was so tragically the case last week in Berbice.

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