So often on our roads, mishaps involving articulated vehicles occur that take the lives of scores of people at a go. A plethora of reasons are usually adduced to such incidents that range from bad roads, poorly trained drivers, intoxicated drivers, carelessness in fitting the containers to the back of the trucks, lack of regulations, to name but a few.
In it, lives are being lost. The FRSC recorded 5,320 road crashes and 2,471 deaths between January and June 2021 nationwide. The crashes involved 8,808 vehicles, in which 15,882 people sustained various injuries, while 15,398 others were rescued without injuries. Between January and March 2020, there were 1,758 deaths; April to June, 855 deaths; and July to September, 1,076 deaths. Speed violation, tyre burst, and dangerous driving were the major causes.
It is puzzling to note that many of these misadventures happen at a few specific spots from time to time, and the same problems persist at the same places with nothing done to forestall future occurrences.
For example, it would seem like containers falling on pedestrians is an annual experience under the Ujuelegba Bridge in Lagos. But year in and year out, the same mishap happens at the same place, with little or nothing done to avert future occurrence.
For a brief chronology of events at that spot, in the last seven years, several accidents have claimed dozens of lives. For instance, in September 2015, one such incident claimed the lives of three members of the same family. Their relatives instituted a N10billion compensation suit at the Lagos State High Court. Both the Lagos and federal governments, along with the owners of the truck were listed as defendants in the case.
In 2018, two persons died when a truck loaded with boards and plywood tilted over the bridge and thereafter crashed, injuring many.
In 2021, three friends and a cab driver, who were trapped in their vehicle for several hours, survived the ordeal after a tanker fell on the vehicle. It was the first accident, in which all occupants of the vehicle survived.
According to experts, incessant accidents on the bridge are a result of the absence of guard rails, which have been vandalised over the years.
In another incident, which happened on Saturday, April 2, a middle-aged man who was driving a Honda Accord car was crushed to death when the truck fell off the bridge and landed on his car.
But not only at the Ujuelegba Bridge is the falling of containers and trucks frequent, it happens virtually across the length and breadth of the country, and for various reasons, including broken-down roads and negligence on the part of law-enforcement agencies.
Former Lagos vice chairman, Nigerian Association of Road Transport Owners (NARTO), Alhaji Inuwa Abdullahi, when asked about the frequent of articulated vehicles on the roads said, “The issue is that during raining season, a lot of roads are submerged by flood, and most portions that are submerged by floods are riddled with potholes and there won’t be any sign to indicate that to the drivers. Most times, when they hit the potholes, the truck loses balance and tilts over.
“Fatigue is another issue. Drivers drive for so long. For instance, a distance of three hours, you will see truck drivers spending three days because of bad roads or traffic and they have a long distance to cover in order to get to where to rest. And by then, they are tired on the road, they sleep off on the steering wheel and accidents occur.
“Fatigue leads to loss of control and they can’t rest anywhere because of insecurity, hence they need to get to a park, which is mostly in the city outskirts.
“However, the government should build enough recreation centers for truck drivers to rest because fatigue is mostly the cause of accidents with articulated vehicles. Government should also maintain the roads, dangerous zones and end insecurity on the roads because drivers drive for several hours before they get to a safe place to rest.
“Government should also repair flooded roads, ensure that the roads are well tarred with signs where necessary because we, on our own, are training our drivers. They need to learn the road signs.”
Also, the chairman, Association of Maritime Trucks Owners (AMATO), Apapa, Emechebe Okafor, said fatigue, drug abuse and bad roads are responsible for truck accidents on the nation’s highway.
According to Okafor, some Nigeria roads are not road worthy for trucks, saying fatigue of truck drivers should be dealt with by relevant agencies of government.
“Our roads are not worthy for trucks to ply on. Most roads are dilapidated and they lead to accidents.
“Also, fatigue as some of these drivers do not have good rest. They don’t have enough sleep because of the extended days it takes them to get to their destinations.
“Also, drug abuse, though, not all of them are into drug abuse but those who are into it are addicted. They take several drugs and smoke among others. They do these to gain self-confidence and this is dangerous,”he said.
Despite the surfeit of traffic safety agencies, Nigerian roads are notoriously unsafe. The agencies appear more interested in generating revenue than ensuring highway safety. In addition, many of the country’s nearly 200,000 kilometres of roads are dilapidated, ill-maintained and potholed. The result is a heavy toll on lives and limbs through avoidable road crashes. About 2,500 persons died in over 5,000 RTCs in the first six months of this year, official records show.
In Lagos, the Vehicle Inspection Office, Federal Road Safety Corps, Nigeria Police, and other officers daily besiege the roads, randomly checking vehicle documents, but paying scant attention to the safety of road users and free traffic flow. Shamefully, rickety trucks with bad, misaligned tyres and buses still ply the roads ferrying goods and passengers. These deadly contraptions are often given a free pass by law enforcement officers, who routinely extort their drivers while turning a blind eye to the danger they pose to road users.
In Abuja, the federal capital, VIO officers routinely obstruct traffic on major roads, ambush and extort motorists who fail to present vehicle documents on demand.
Articulated vehicles with worn-out tyres, poor alignment; taxi cabs and buses without headlamps and rear lights, overloaded with goods and passengers are a common sight on major roads. Carelessly, the Federal Capital Territory Administration leaves most Abuja roads without street lights, which contributes to the disturbing crashes in the city. Many intersections do not have traffic lights. The number of traffic wardens deployed to busy junctions by the police authorities is inadequate. Ghastly motor accidents at intersections are a frequent occurrence in the FCT.
The head of information and public enlightenment, FCT Directorate of Road Traffic Services (FCT-DRTS), Kalu Emetu, has explained what the directorate is doing to reduce crashes involving articulated vehicles in the nation’s capital.
Kalu told NATIONAL ECONOMY that in FCT, there is a law which prohibits the movement of articulated vehicles, within the city centres and every other entry and exit routes, from 5am to 10am and from 4pm to 10pm.
The reason for this law, according to him, is for them not to compete with smaller vehicles on the roads, because it has been observed in the past, that articulated vehicles have caused many accidents which has led to loss of many lives, especially along the Mararaba-Nyanya axis.
So, because of this, the government had to come up with this timing regulation. And with this, any of the articulated vehicles seen on the road within that period will be made to clear from the road. This is meant to reduce crashes on our roads.
“Moreover, you don’t see articulated vehicles moving in the city centre, not until when the roads are cleared.
“And I will tell you that since the introduction of this timing regulation, a lot of accidents have been averted on FCT roads.
“If you observe, during the peak hours on these roads, our men are always busy stopping them.
“However, the challenge we have is that many of the operators of these articulated vehicles find it difficult to obey the directive. And even at that, we will continue to enforce the directive because many lives have been saved since the introduction of this regulation,” he explained.
However, speaking, the executive director, Accident Prevention and Rescue Initiative (APRI), Prince Fidelis Nnadi, noted that the increasing road crashes on the roads have become a very critical issue, because it affects the people, the economy and so many areas of human activity.
Nnadi noted that not much has been done by the government and the society to help the situation.
According to him, “By right, it is the function of the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) to address the frequent accidents caused by articulated vehicles on the highways.
“The question is, when these trucks break down on the highways, who is responsible for evacuating them. And if it is the FRSC that is responsible for the evacuation of broken-down articulated vehicles on the highways, does it have the resources, equipment and manpower to perform this function?
“From my own point of view, the FRSC does not have the necessary equipment and materials that would even warn oncoming vehicles as against a broken down vehicle on the highways.”
He observed that whenever any vehicle is broken down on the highways, there is usually no sign to warn oncoming vehicles of the incident, and this has led to unsuspecting vehicles to run into them, leading to loss of lives, especially at night.
“We keep counting the losses without looking for the solution. This is the problem we have been having in this country, and it has been there for a long time.
“But the truth is that we don’t have a dedicated emergency response commission. If they had an emergency response commission, that is dedicated to responding to emergency issues, such emergency response corps would have been patrolling the roads to know what constitutes dangers on the highways.
“It is sad, because the FRSC has not been up and doing in this regard.For some time now, I have been advocating for the creation of an emergency response commission that would patrol both the local, state and federal roads to, not only respond to emergencies when it occurs, but also prevent accidents from occurring on the roads.
“Much of the responsibility of averting the next disaster rests with the governments at federal, state and local government levels. They need to ensure that the roads are well maintained, and drivers, especially truck drivers are well monitored and regulated.”
