WINDHOEK – The National Road Safety Council (NRSC) and the Motor Vehicle Accident (MVA) Fund of Namibia jointly launched their 2014/15 Festive Season Road Safety Campaign last week Friday at the Katutura Youth Sports Complex, calling on churches and other social partners to join in the road safety campaign.
“The ministry calls on all stakeholders to further ensure that the message of road safety is spread everywhere in places such as Churches, schools, businesses and communities amongst others, with the aim to ensure that everyone is on board in ensuring safe roads in Namibia,” said the Deputy Minister of Transport, Kilus Nguvauva, who said from January to October 2014, a number of 2,816 road crashes were recorded on the Namibian roads resulting into 4,993 persons injured.
Nguvauva pointed out that this figures translate to an average of 16 people injured on a daily basis on the Namibian roads. As such he called upon the Churches to intervene and assist in arresting the situation.
The festive season road safety campaign is running from 1 November 2014 to 15 January 2015. During this period all road traffic law enforcement agencies are put on alert and given clear instructions to prosecute anyone that drives without a driving licence and those found to be having motor vehicles that are not fit to be on the roads.
The Namibian Police Traffic Department will be conducting highway patrols on a daily basis to identify and deal with those driving recklessly. At the same time, their officers will be on the highways to deal with the speedsters.
Nguvauva was further of the view that road crashes are caused by human factors. Now as these humans are gearing to go towards elections by the end of this month, he called for extra caution on the part of road users in order to prevent further “road bloodshed”.
This year, the Ministry of Defence has been roped in to provide ambulance services especially on the notorious B1 and B2 roads respectively. Their ambulances will be on standby on the highways at some strategic places, which would be nearer to potential crash sites. They will be supporting the ambulance services of the Ministry of Health, which is currently in short supply and need to attend to other national emergencies. The MVA fund call centre will coordinate the activities of this ambulance services.
The general public is advised, that should you come across an accident, call the accident response number 0819682 for assistance.
By Felix Tjozongoro