The Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) in Niger on Friday said that Road Traffic Crashes (RTCs) claimed no fewer than 473 lives in the state between January 2022 and June 2023.
The State Sector Commander, Mr Kumar Tsukwam, disclosed this in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Minna. Tsukwam said that in view of the high number of deaths recorded through RTCs in the state, the command was working tirelessly to reduce crashes in the state to the barest minimum.
He explained that within the period under review, the command recorded 766 RTCs, with about 5, 272 persons involved, with 2, 607 sustaining various degree of injuries. The sector commander also said that 204 of the RTCs were fatal, 483 serious while and 79 were minor.
He explained that the RTCs were caused by human, vehicular and environmental factors. He, however, said that the corps concentrated on the drivers during sensitization, because little mistakes by them could lead to accidents as they drive and control the vehicles.
“The attitude of a driver while driving matters a lot and compliance to traffic rules and regulations is also important. Therefore, it is the human that is responsible for many of the accidents,” he said.
Tsukwam said that the corps had embarked on daily sensitisation known as “Early Morning Cry” to motor-parks in the state. He said that the aim of the sensitisation was to enlighten road users, especially commercial drivers, on the need to obey traffic rules and regulations.
“Every day, we go to the motor parks to talk to commercial drivers and also take a look at their vehicles to determine the road worthiness.
“When you obey traffic rules and regulations, you have saved your own life and the lives of other road users,” the sector commander said.
He cautioned road users, especially commercial drivers, against night journeys, because of the bad condition of many roads and security challenges across the country.
“We went to one of the motor parks in the state around 12 a.m., when we noticed that a particular driver wanted to travel to Lagos; we stopped him with the help of the union.
“What we are advocating for now is for drivers to shun night journeys, because of the dangers on our roads,” the FRSC boss said.
Tsukam urged residents of the state to always respect traffic rules and regulations, while using the roads in order to prevent RTCs.
“RTCs have claimed many lives, while others have been maimed for life,” he said.
According to the FRSC boss, under the global framework and plan of action, there are five pillars the corps considers during operations. He said that these five pillars are the vehicle, road mobility, driver, road user and post-crash.
“Under this arrangement, it is supposed to take us maximum of 15 minutes to get to the scene of any accident to save live,” he said.
Tsukwam appealed to the state government to collaborate with the corps in establishing more help areas to enable them reach accident scene on time.