HARARE - Roads accidents have claimed 546 lives since January, raising alarm among stakeholders, who yesterday called for harsher penalties on commuter omnibuses.
Speaking at nationwide march against road carnage yesterday Ernest Muchena, product development and marketing manager for the Traffic Safety Council of Zimbabwe said 546 people died in 399 fatal accidents countrywide from January to April.
Since January there has been a total of 12 954 accidents which have left 4 733 people injured.
Petronella Kagonye, the deputy minister of Transport said road accidents are avoidable.
“Road traffic crash is a total loss unless something useful can be learned from it,” said Kagonye.
“These figures are disturbing and every road safety stakeholder must learn from the road crashes so as to be able to avoid them,” she added.
Kagonye, who spoke on behalf his boss Obert Mpofu, said her ministry was putting in place stern measures in order to curb road carnage.
The ministry has promised the nation that they will ensure that all the commuter omnibus operators who would have failed to comply with the road traffic laws will be punished.
“My ministry shall step up collaborative efforts to ensure that all those who fail to comply with the road traffic laws are brought to book,” said Kagonye.
Kagonye also tore into public transport operators whom she accused of deliberately employing unqualified drivers in order to cut costs.
She said the Chitungwiza-bound kombi that killed 10 people recently had neither a passenger-liability insurance cover nor a route authority as outlined in Section 7 of the Road Motor Transportation Act.
“Every individual, family village, church and media house must be road safety conscious and walk the talk about making our roads much safer for use by everyone eligible,” she said