Over-speeding is an important risk factor for road traffic accidents, and every year many people die as a result of road traffic crashes.
In Nigeria, it has rendered many children orphans and overloading has taken a different dimension as trailer drivers now load passengers along side with goods and animals.
LEADERSHIP Sunday investigations showed that 87 persons have died from road accidents in just one month as a result of overloading, overspeeding, reckless driving, loading animals with passengers and carrying fuel in gallons while traveling.
The corps marshal of the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), Dauda Ali Biu while speaking on this issue, said between March 31 and April 30, “we lost 87 people. They were all burnt behind recognition as a result of vehicles carrying fuel and exploding when accidents happen.
Some of these incidents happened in Obajana, where we lost 13 on March 31. At Ogbomosho, we lost 19 people on April 14 in yet another raid crash involving buses.
“In Kano, we lost 11 on April 19, the following day, April 20, we lost eight persons in Otukpo, Benue State.
In Okene-Lokoja bypass, on April 28, we lost 19 persons while on April 30, in Nsukka, we lost 17 persons again. All burnt beyond recognition. We were battling with the news of the April 28, when we got the report of April 30 that another 17 persons have died. I can tell you that I couldn’t sleep that night.
All these accidents happened with buses carrying fuel.”
Major road crashes and deaths in 2024
Our investigation also showed that in an instant in January, 2024, 16 people were killed when a commercial bus lost control and plunged into a ditch on the Kano-Kaduna expressway in Nigeria’s northern state of Kaduna as a result of overspeeding.
Kabir Nadabo, a commander of the Federal Road Safety Corps in Kaduna said the incident was caused by overspeeding, as the driver lost control of the vehicle.
Also, on January 19, at least 10 people were killed and 12 others injured when a bus and a car recently rammed into each other in Nigeria’s northern state of Jigawa.
A spokesman for the Federal Road Safety Corps in Jigawa, Ibrahim Yahaya said the incident was caused by wrongful overtaking due to the flouting of traffic rules which caused the two vehicles to collide head-on.
Yahaya said. “The vehicles immediately went aflame and burned beyond recognition, wreaking more havoc.
Also, due to speeding and reckless driving, on January 2, six persons lost their lives while 11 sustained injuries in a multiple road crash at Aliko Filling Station on the Kaduna-Zaria expressway.
Also, on January 10, three persons died, and three others were injured in a road accident that occurred on the Enugu-Abakaliki expressway, in Ebonyi State.
Two days after, an 18-seater bus belonging to Katsina State Transport Agency, which was travelling to Abuja from Kankara local government area was involved in a road crash, killing seven people, including two children.
On January 13, a truck at excessive speed lost control and hit four individuals waiting to board a bus at Toll Gate on the Lagos-Abeokuta Expressway. One of the victims died, while three others sustained injury.
A woman was also killed while another sustained injuries when a truck loaded with gravel and two smaller vehicles crashed along Airport Road, Lugbe Abuja, on Monday, January 15.
While five people died in the first accident, which occurred around the Foursquare Gospel Camp in the Ajebo axis of Obafemi-Owode Local Government Area, two others lost their lives in the second accident which happened at the old Toll Gate at Ogere in the Ikenne local government area of Ogun State.
Preventions and interventions
The corps marshal.while speaking on preventive measures to curtail these incidents, said: “We investigated and discovered that these buses carry fuel while traveling because they claim that there is fuel scarcity and some others claim they prices of fuel are cheaper in some areas than another.
“To address this, we have started searching all vehicles and anyone with fuel, we remove it and make sure they don’t travel with it. In the last one month ago that we started this operations, out of 100 vehicles, all of them were carrying gallons of fuel in the vehicle.
“We will also continue to pursue this prosecution. Unlike the misconception people have that we are out to get fine. No, Road Safety is not established to make fines, rather, we were established to save lives and properties. It is not a revenue generating organisation for the federal government.
“Our idea now is that instead of asking you to go and pay the paltry sum some of money as fines, we have dcided to prosecute serious offenders and work with the court to get them to pay the maximum fines, which may be jail term or large sum of money as fines.
“We are also taking our messages to the grassroots and alling on the media to also help us disseminate information that would educate the members of the public on the dangers of overloading ans overspeeding.”
On the plans for reducing crashes and possibly deaths from road crashes this year, the corps marshal said the management of the FRSC has set target of reducing the percentage of road crashes as accidents have already started from December 2023 into January 2024.
LEADERSHIP investigation showed that between December 15, 2023 and January 15, 2024; road crashes, also referred to as road accidents, claimed the lives of 335 persons.
Collaborating the report, the FRSC corps marshal explained that “on fatalities recorded from 15 December 2023 to 15 January, 2024, the corps recorded a total 335 deaths nationwide as against 350 recorded in the same period in 2022. This represents four per cent reduction.
“Between 15 of December, 2023 and 15 January, 2024, which marked the period of the special patrol operations, a total of 634 road traffic crashes took place nationwide, as against 535 in the same period in 2022 representing 19 per cent increase. The 2023 crashes involved 4709 people, this is against 4162 recorded in 2022 signifying 13 per cent increase.
“Meanwhile, the total number of people injured increased by 17 per cent as the corps has a record of 2,055 people injured in 2023 against 1762 in the same period in 2022.”
Also, the corps rescued a total of 2,319 persons in 2023 signifying 13 per cent increase compared to a total of 2,050 recorded in 2022.