‘Together we move SA forward’ – dept
Speeding as well as reckless and negligent driving is the cause of more people dying on the province's roads this year.
POLOKWANE – Speeding as well as reckless and negligent driving is the cause of more people dying on the province’s roads this year.
This surfaced at the department of transport, security and liaison’s launch of October Transport Month last Thursday.
The theme for this year’s Transport Month is, Together We Move South Africa Forward.
General manager of Limpopo traffic and safety, Jane Mulaudzi, said from July to September last year 140 people died on the province’s roads and during the same period this year, 212 people died.
“In most of the accidents the cause was speeding and reckless and negligent driving,” Mulaudzi explained, adding that there was also concern over the number of pedestrians who died on public roads.
“We will run several programmes at schools to educate learners about road safety.
“Some of these projects include learners’ participation in debates on road safety, allowing schools to come up with techniques to overcome challenges in road safety,” Mulaudzi said.
Transport, security and liaison MEC, Mapula Mokaba-Phukwana, said that during the inception of transport month in October 2005, one of the key objectives was to encourage the South African public to use public transport as opposed to private vehicles.
“This initiative was an attempt to decrease traffic congestion and greenhouse gasses.
“In Limpopo, government spends over half a billion rand in bus subsidies to ensure that bus commuters are able to use reliable, safer and affordable buses.
“Government further introduced taxi recapitalisation in order to ensure that minibus taxis that transport masses of our people are safe and reliable,” Mokaba-Phukwana said.
Hanli du Plessis, head of transport, security and liaison, added that the department spends R600 million on bus subsidies annually and there are 18 bus companies that are subsidised by the department.
“There are 45 million passenger trips we subsidise annually.
“This comes from the grant supplied by the national department of transport,” Du Plessis said.
October Transport Month will focus on the following aspects:
• Public transport;
• Road safety;
• Transport regulations and compliance;
• Drug trafficking and human trafficking by means of transport, and
• transport infrastructure projects.
Motorists are also urged by the department to change their number plates from the N registration to L as the final deadline to replace them is August 2016.
“Road safety is the responsibility of every South African.
“We share our roads and have a choice to enjoy our good infrastructure as responsible citizens or to be part of the tragedy.
“The success of our road safety campaign depends on all of us doing our part to create safer roads.
“As responsible citizens we must not accept the overcrowding of vehicles or get into vehicles that are clearly not roadworthy,” Mokaba-Phukwana said.
