Driving licences or licences to kill?

When a prominent person dies in an accident much is written about the deceased and when lesser-known people die their deaths are often not even reported but their passing away is of concern to their immediate family and friends. In both cases grief is expressed for the deceased but little is thereafter done to address the cause of such accidents.

The death toll from accidents has been increasing in Tanzania but we still continue to see careless causes leading to the deaths of many on our streets and highways. Not a day passes without an accident being reported and if one was to collect newspaper clippings of accidents over the last decade, these would be enough to come up with textbooks of accident coverage reports.

Accidents commonly arise from bad or careless driving, driving when drowsy, driving under the influence of alcohol, driving with cell-phones and because of poor road signs and bad roads. Accidents also occur when road systems lack reliable traffic lights, reliable pedestrian crossings, fine footpaths and adequate speed control systems. 

In Tanzania, if one would hear road safety enforcers speak about safety on our streets it would appear that we have an ideal road-safety system in place. This may partly be true on paper where we may have rules, regulations and laws in place but of what use are these if we lack enforcement and management of such rules. If there were enforcement, this would always be followed by compliance.

Let's look at how driving licences are awarded. Control over the issue of licences should be of high priority but it is an open secret that one can buy licences for a small amount of money. Don’t those responsible for ensuring safe driving ever think of the dangers poised by untested drivers when they drive on our roads without obtaining legal licences? If anyone at any level of competence can get a driving licence of what use are all our rules, road-signs and regulations?

Even when a driver gets a legal driving licence he can drive drunk because there are no breathalysers and no stern punishments. He can drive fast because there are no speed guns or radar traps to check speeds within the city boundary. He can drive badly, overtaking from the left, zigzagging or whatever and the chances are that he will rarely be caught.

Last month a dala dala van drove through a no-entry sign and almost hit one of our company vehicles head-on. Our driver swerved and damaged his car by hitting a roundabout but the other driver drove away without even caring to stop. The road safety system did not have the means of identifying and nabbing such a dangerous driver and the culprit continues to drive on our streets. As long as we do not come up with the means to control bad driving, the car driving licence will continue to be a potential licence to kill.