Road safety campaigns ineffective

1

Number of road accidents in the state still high, human factor the leading cause, says Manyin

Manyin (third left) together with (from second left) Chan, Davina and Mohd Hatta giving their thumbs-up after Manyin fixes the road safety message sticker on a bus yesterday.

Manyin (third left) together with (from second left) Chan, Davina and Mohd Hatta giving their thumbs-up after Manyin fixes the road safety message sticker on a bus yesterday.

KUCHING: Road safety campaigns mounted during festive seasons like Chinese New Year, Hari Raya Puasa, Gawai and Christmas have proven to have limited effect in reducing the number of accidents in the state.

Infrastructure Development and Communication Minister Dato Sri Michael Manyin in stating this observation said Sarawak ranked 10th in number of road accidents in the country with 1.3 fatalities per day as compared to the national average of 18.3 per day.

He added although the average fatalities were low compared to the national average, urgent measures must be taken to reduce the number of accidents in the state.

Manyin noted that based on police statistics, more than 60 per cent of road accidents were caused by human factor, which meant that they were avoidable if road users had exercised discipline and followed traffic laws on the road.

The minister pointed out that the key towards better road safety in the state was improvement of public transportation.

“As a minister-in-charge of infrastructure development in Sarawak, I am appealing to ministry-in-charge and Putrajaya to give allocation to us to improve the public transportation starting with Kuching, Sibu, Miri and Bintulu.

“This is the long term solution for public transport. Don’t try to stop people from buying cars if we don’t have good public transport. How do we go to work?” Manyin said when launching a road safety campaign in conjunction with the coming Chinese New Year here yesterday.

Although his ministry had not come up with the cost required to improve public transportation in the state, Manyin believed that it would definitely be billions of ringgit.

“It is very expensive but I don’t think we have any choice. You look at Kuala Lumpur where they have public transportation like the Light Railway Transit (LRT), that cost billions of ringgit.”

He said currently, there are 1.7 million vehicles on the road in Sarawak compared to the state’s population of only about 2.6 million while the number of new vehicles registered every year is between 80,000 and 90,000.

He also highlighted the need for the state to have railway services, similar like the service offered in countries like China, Taiwan and Australia as another solution to reduce road accidents.

“Of course, it will be expensive but in the long run, it will definitely solve a lot of problems. One of the advantages is that it can ferry many people.

“No private railway operators will be able to survive. It has to be subsidised by the government. Most of the railways in the world cannot survive on their own, they are subsidised heavily by the government.”

Manyin also called on the state police, Road Transport Department (RTD) and Department of Occupational Safety and Health (DOSH) to come up with concrete suggestions on how to reduce the number of accidents in the state.

Among those present at the event were Kuching South City Council mayor Dato James Chan, state RTD director Ibrahim Othman, state DOSH director Ir Mohd Hatta Zakaria, state Police Head of Public order and Traffic Supt Mohammad Sar’ie Fauzi and state Road Safety Department director Davina Agnes Enteli.