By Isaac Massaquoi
This time last week Sierra Leone was in still in shock following the tragic death of Dr. Anthony Soyei in a road accident just outside Bo town. Anthony was a man with a bright future ahead of him. A week before his 50th birthday, he met what we must call an untimely death and we should make no mistake, this is a very big loss to his family, his friends and the country.
The outcry that followed this incident focussed the nation’s attention on the many other Sierra Leoneans who have and continue to die on our roads. During the week a police officer appeared on radio to answer questions about just why so many people were being killed in accidents all over the country. His job was a difficult one because during in the interactive segment of the program, many people blamed the police for not doing their job properly on the roads. The usual accusations of bribe-taking by police highway patrol officers, absenteeism and alcohol drinking while on duty were heaped on the officer. He fought back bravely but there were many holes in the arguments he made.
I shall return to that before the end of this piece and make a very basic point to help the officer with his Public Relations job, going forward.
We were also told that 162 people were killed in road accidents throughout Sierra Leone during the first five months of 2012. Actually, by the time the program came to an end, reports were coming through of another accident in the Magburaka area of northern Sierra Leone with about four more deaths. By all accounts, this is a very serious matter - and these are only figures for those accidents that were recorded.
I can bet my last penny that many other deaths occurred that were not recorded by police. In Sierra Leone, people easily dismiss things like accidents as acts of God or the devil. Unless we begin to look for the answers on earth, the nation will continue to lose good people like Dr. Soyei and the more than one hundred others who’ve perished on our roads so far this year.
When the figures came out last week, I told colleagues in the office that once again, we shall be treating them like the ones the births and deaths office publish every year. I was actually saying that very few or no hard questions will be asked about these alarming figures. As a media, we have never tried to disaggregate the births and deaths figures to account for why more people die in one region more than the others or why birth rate was higher in some areas than others. We simply publish the figures and episodically run off to report another incident and another incident and another incident. This is what I fear will happen to this rising death toll caused by road accidents.
Let’s not hide this; police highway patrols are just non-existent. All you see when you travel out of Freetown are police check points where they check nothing. They simply collect their “booking fees” which all commercial vehicles pay and wave vehicles through. Cast your eyes about fifty yards or so from the checkpoint, you will see some police officers drinking palm wine and young girls selling all sorts of things milling around. Checkpoints are supposed to be security areas but just take a look at what we have at Mile 38 and the other Checkpoint close to Bo town and see what the men are blue are normally up to.
Also let’s consider the quality of the vehicles on the roads. More than half the commercial vehicles we have both is Freetown and the provinces will not pass a road worthiness test even in hell. Try using those rickety Peugeot cars to ply between Bo and Gendema on the border with Liberia and see how the drivers manipulate their gears between the legs of passengers. The situation is the same in Magburaka.
Those vehicles are completely overloaded under the noses of police officers; they pass through all the checkpoints, dropping cash at every stage with no regard for the safety or comfort of their passengers who at all times have no option but stay quiet and endure the journey on some of the worst roads in this country. The drivers are rude and care only about money. Passengers have no choice as to which vehicle to use because that is pre-arranged by greedy drivers union officials who run the parks. They make a huge kill daily. It doesn’t matter the quality of the vehicle in the queue, as long as it’s in the position, passengers must get onboard or perish.
To me that system pre-supposes that all the vehicles are of the same quality but that is really not the case. So here is the irony, the more we fight the government to open up the democratic space at national level, the more a genuine democratic choice gets squeezed by greedy motor park operators and the passenger is as hopeless as a customer in a barber’s chair.
And please let’s not assume it’s only happening in dark corners of the country, it’s happening right here in Freetown where police officers and traffic wardens are turning a blind eye because their cut daily.
Come with me to Model Junction in Central Freetown. I find it difficult to believe that almost all the vehicles plying the route between Model junction and Fourah Bay College campus and also those going up to Leicester ever passed the fitness test at the Sierra Leone Road Transport Authority. Was any test done at all? Because police are completely absent on this very dangerous stretch of narrow winding road up steep hills, the cars are normally packed with students and traders like sardines. I really hate to sound negative but those vehicles are coffins on wheels and Freetown should never be surprised if another major accident occurs soon.
Model Junction has been taken over by Drivers Union people, Petty traders and Pickpockets who operate in full view of the few police officers who for some good part of the day abandon the area for God knows where. To see a practical demonstration of this, try and visit the place twice a day. Make sure you are there at 1pm when all the schools in that area are changing shift. You normally get pupils from Government Rokel, Government Model, Albert Academy, Muslim Brotherhood secondary schools and the numerous primary schools in the area, all in one place – add the hundreds of FBC students who have to struggle to catch those cars for class everyday and you have absolute chaos. The same situation is repeated at 5pm when schools are off for the day. Model junction is a disaster waiting to happen. The same can be said of the Lumley round-about.
What should be done then?
Sierra Leone is perhaps the only country in the world that has not taken a firm and clear position on the importation of used cars into this country – in other words we are not sure how old the cars that are brought here should be. How can we be sure that like the second hand clothing business, old and dangerous cars are not just dumped here all the time? Take a look around Freetown and see how many used car centres are springing up all the time.
Still on the question of vehicle road worthiness, the Sierra Leone Road Transport Authority should do its job of doing comprehensive and periodic checks of particularly commercial vehicles throughout the country. You can start with those that, as a matter of rule are constantly overloaded plying the Model – FBC – Leicester route. Police officers or Wardens should deal with the overloading problem at Model junction and other areas or set up a checking area on FBC campus. I am quite sure everybody will cooperate with this to save lives.
It’s also important to take a look at what we call road signs on our roads. They are completely ridiculous. They are small and are not prominently displayed. The paint used to mark out Zebra crossings is normally wiped out within a few weeks of being painted. Next time you approach Christ Church from Campbell Street, look at the road signs that direct motorists to Circular road, West Street and ahead through Pademba road and tell me what you think. I can’t understand why Sierra Leone is different. I am not an expert in this but I make bold to say that neighbouring Conakry has my idea of proper road signs.
The Sierra Leone Road Transport Authority has a small and weak road safety campaign going on. That must be intensified and diversified tenfold. When you board a road transport bus in Freetown, especially the so-called express service in the mornings, a few minutes before departure, an evangelist will appear in the vehicle to preach the word of God– no problem with that. I however think alongside those aggressive Evangelists should be a road safety officer who would bring road safety messages to the passengers. It doesn’t matter if he only regularly told people that they should never allow the drivers to talk on mobile phones or watching Nigerian movies on portable DVDs while sitting at the steering wheel. The SLRTC should urgently re-instate road inspectors with integrity like the late Gasconie Davies who made his name ensuring discipline and safety on SLRTC buses.
It will cost good money if it was professionally done, but saving lives should be the paramount concern.
Now back to the police officer who went on radio to throw light on the many deaths in road accidents so far this year. Every time police officers appear in the media, they behave like politicians. They refuse to accept any blame or concede sound arguments because they think it will make the force look bad. Actually blaming everybody else without taking responsibility where they clearly ought to; makes them look worse.
In the 98.1 interview, every time the issue of corrupt police officers came up, our man quickly ran to the fact that a lot of the officers are university graduates these days. That’s very encouraging but how does that insulate them from the corruption that the whole country knows is taking place openly on our roads.
My parting word to my police friend is that, when the nation is in mourning, like on that day following Dr Soyei’s death, the officers that appear in the media should be very sensitive to the realities around such matters and be careful how they approach interviews.
