THE increase in the number of road traffic accidents in Zambia is worrisome.
Despite several interventions by the Road Transport and Safety Agency (RTSA) and the Zambia Police to bring sanity on the roads, the fatalities are still on the rise.
In the first six months of 2015, about 1,028 people lost their lives in road accidents, leaving the country’s road related fatality rate at 31 per 100,000.
The setting up of the Lusaka Fast Track Court for Traffic Offences seemed to be the answer in mitigating the problem as in the past three months more than 1,000 motorists were convicted for abrogating various road traffic regulations.
About eight motorists are currently serving jail sentences for committing different road traffic offences.
Some sentences have been custodial while others were in default of payment of fines.
Dangerous driving has remained one of the highest offences recorded under the Fast Court for Traffic Offences.
The statistics show that 233 motorists were convicted for dangerous driving, while another 233 drivers were charged for the offence of expired Road Tax.
The increase in the number of unlicenced drivers on the public roads is worrying as it is connected to the high number of accidents in the country caused by human error.
RTSA announced this month that a total of 99 drivers were convicted for the offence of unlicenced driving.
To help fight this vice, RTSA decided to introduce weekly enforcement operations targeted at eliminating unlicenced driving, over speeding and driving under the influence of alcohol among others.
This operation seemed to have gained momentum in four provinces namely Central, Copperbelt, Lusaka and Southern.
The numbers of offences related to disregarding traffic rules and road safety have remained high despite all these measures.
Therefore, the call by the Zambia Road Safety Trust (ZRST) to review the status of some measures Government has put in place to improve road safety is timely.
ZRST is concerned with the increasing road traffic accidents, hence the need for an urgent meeting involving various stakeholders to review the status of road safety programmes.
This came in the wake of a road accident that claimed the lives of 17 people in Lusaka at the weekend.
ZRST spokesperson Miles Mwale called on the Ministry of Transport to facilitate the indaba as soon as possible so that the implementation status of various measures intended to improve the deteriorating road safety situation in the country are reviewed.
Mr Mwale noted that unless drastic measures were put in place, the number of deaths through road accidents could soar further thereby defeating the purpose of reducing road fatalities by at least 50 per cent by 2020.
The call by ZRST needs to be taken seriously by all concerned parties in the fight to reduce road accidents.
It is also imperative for all motorists to always stick to traffic rules and road safety and be more diligent to avoid inconveniences.