African leaders have been charged to show more commitment and political will towards reducing road crashes on the continent.
The Commissioner for Infrastructure and Energy at the African Union Commission, Dr. Amani Abou-zeid, who gave the charge said; effective dialogue as well as close collaboration and coordination were important element to saving the continent’s human and financial resources from preventable road crashes.
According to the UN Economic commission for Africa’ ECA between 3 to 5 % of annual GDP are loss due to road crashes on the continent.
Due to rapid urbanization and development more than half of the populations in Africa would live in cities thereby creating opportunities for the continent’s development, however at the same time, this would pose challenges for mobility.
Safe, affordable, sustainable and accessible transport systems would help reverse Africa’s poor yet, unacceptable high figures of crashes on the road. The continent accounts for 20% of global road traffic deaths with nearly 272 000 deaths. It accounts for 14% of the total world population and 3% of the total number of registered vehicles.
Addressing an African ministerial roundtable on road safety: towards a post- 2020 strategy, on the sidelines of the 3rd high level global conference, Dr. Abou-zeid, rallied member countries of the continental body; the AU, to go beyond the enthusiasm in Stockholm to halving road crashes by the next decade.
“This is not a political speech. It is a call to action and the action is within our hands. This needs lots of coordination among different ministries and institutions, but someone must rally others along for t to be done so that we can half the road crashes too. The chatter on road safety has not been ratified by many of our member countries hence we can’t implement. The same enthusiasm showed here in Stockholm should be exhibited back home. Radical actions on road designs, constructions should have everyone in mind. Behaviors should be checked including helmets and seatbelts. The enforcement should also go alongside,” she remarked.
The meeting, which brought together African ministers responsible for road safety through facilitations from the UN’s Economic Commission for Africa (ECA), discussed the continent’s road safety priorities and strategies for the next 10 years.
These include; improving road safety management and sustainable funding, engaging with CSOs and private sector involvement as well as the reliance on innovated technology and improving the legal and regulatory environment among others.
Still on road safety, the ECA in collaboration with the UN special envoy for road safety, the African Transport Policy Programme and the Kofi Annan Foundation would in May this year, launch an award scheme for countries that are showing leadership in road safety.
The maiden “Kofi Annan Award for Road safety,” to be held in Ghana’s capital, Accra, would recognize African countries that experienced decline in road traffic fatalities through the establishment of robust regulatory environment for road safety during the decade.
This was announced in a speech read for the executive secretary for the ECA Dr. Vera Songwe, at the just ended ministerial conference on road safety in Stockholm Sweden.
The award will also recognize top performers in the African Road Safety implementation action plan 2011-2020.
Story by: Nelson Adanuti Nyadror.
Back from Stockholm, Sweden. This was made possible through the International Center for Journalists’ Road Safety 2020 Reporting Fellowship.
