Chronicle EditorRichard Muponde, Plumtree Correspondent
THE Traffic Safety Council of Zimbabwe (TSCZ) has urged motorists to plan their journeys and ensure they are in the right frame of mind in order to reduce accidents this festive season.
In an interview yesterday, TSCZ communications manager, Mr Tatenda Chinoda said the safety campaign launched this week was meant to remind motorists to exercise due caution on the roads to avoid accidents which normally increase during public holidays such as Christmas and New Year.
“We are being guided by our theme ‘Save lives #slowdown’. We know that we’re going to have unprecedented volumes of human and vehicle traffic during the festive season. The festive season presents high risk of road carnage hence we’re reminding the public and motorists of the dangers of human error on the country’s roads. For instance the Tsholotsho disaster was as a result of human error after a driver failed to negotiate a curve due to speeding. This is what we are trying to avoid,” said Mr Chinoda.
He described the campaign as a “repent or perish gospel”.
“We are urging the public to change their attitude and conscience on the roads. Most people don’t plan their journeys especially on how to travel, when to travel and the fitness of the vehicles they are going to travel with. People don’t care about all these important things,” he said.
Mr Chinoda said the campaign will end on January 5 after having been launched last week.
“What we’re doing with the help of the police is to stop motorists and we quickly and swiftly talk to them and wish them a Merry Christmas and New Year. We also give them a takeaway flyer with our campaign messages. If they want a sticker they pull off the road we stick it at the rear of the vehicle. Another hidden campaign in this is that we have drivers who don’t want to stop after every two hours of driving, so by stopping them we hope to rejuvenate their energy and avoid fatigue,” said Mr Chinoda.
Twenty teams have been dispatched across the country.
Two weeks ago, 23 people died in Tsholotsho after a truck they were travelling in veered off the road and overturned after the driver failed to negotiate a curve near Jimila Business Centre.
Every year, the TSCZ conducts road traffic awareness campaigns on the country’s roads especially during public holidays.
In December last year, Zimbabwe and South Africa successfully held a two-day joint awareness campaign in Musina to educate motorists on road traffic regulations and ways to reduce road carnage during the festive season.
The campaign, which was the first of its kind, brought together the TSCZ, the Vehicle Inspectorate Department, Road Agency Fund (South Africa), Nyaradzo Group and Cross Border Association (South Africa)
@richardmuponde
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