Concerns About Fatal Car Accidents in Nigeria

"The menace of road accidents is a serious concern and one of the major causes of deaths worldwide. Yearly, some 1.3 million lives are lost across the world owing to road accidents with a daily number as high as 3000 deaths. Also, about 50 million people suffer fatal injury from these crashes yearly with many leading to permanent disabilities. Of the above statistics, 90% occur in developing countries.

Road traffic injuries (RTI) causes massive economic losses to victims, their families, and to nations as a whole.

These losses arise from the cost of treatment (including rehabilitation and incident investigation) as well as reduced/lost productivity (e.g. wages) for those killed or disabled and for family members who need to take time off work (or school) to care for the injured. There are few global estimates of the costs of injury. Road traffic crashes (RTCs) is believed to cost countries approximately 1.5% of their gross national products; this rises to 2% in some low and middle-income countries.

Get quality help now

Marrie pro writer

Verified writer

Proficient in: Automobile

5 (204)

“ She followed all my directions. It was really easy to contact her and respond very fast as well. ”

+84 relevant experts are online

Hire writer

Expressing these figures with actual monetary values, the global cost is estimated to be US $518 billion per year. Low-income and middle-income countries account for US $65 billion, more than they receive in development assistance. Unfortunately, road traffic injuries have been neglected from the global health agenda for many years, despite being predictable and largely preventable. Nigeria, in the year 2016 recording a road accident rate of 9,694 RTCs out of which 2,638 cases were fatal, 5,633 were serious cases and 1,423 cases were minor with 5,053 persons killed boasts of slightly better figures than the previous year 2015 which saw 9,734 crashes and 5,440 deaths.

This goes without saying that for a country with poorly kept records like Nigeria, arguably more than 30% more of these cases were likely not reported or properly recorded.

The causes of fatal car accidents in Nigeria have been generally categorized into human, mechanical and environmental factors. The human factor accounts for up to 90% of accidents while the mechanical and environmental factors make up the rest. Human factors include visual acuteness, driver fatigue, poor knowledge of road signs and regulations, illiteracy, health problems, excessive speeding, drug abuse and over-confidence while on the steering. Among the mechanical factors that lead to fatal car accidents are poor vehicle maintenance, tyre blowouts, poor lights, un-roadworthy vehicles and broken down vehicles on the road without adequate warning. The environmental factors are summed up into heavy rainfall, harmattan, sun reflection, heavy wind, pot holes and un-tarred roads. These factors have independently and/or collective contributed to the high prevalence rate of fatal car accidents in Nigeria.

Concerns from these statistics of fatal car accidents compelled stakeholders into road safety management including the United Nations (UN) Assembly to seek out with extreme urgency alternative means of curbing fatalities on the road. In May 11, 2011, the UN adopted the period 2011 – 2020 as the UN Decade of Action for Road Safety within which all efforts will concentrate on the official goal of ‘stabilizing and then reducing’ global road traffic fatalities by 2020. According to the UN Secretary General, Ban Ki-Moon, lives would be saved through the decade of Action for Road safety with the primary goal of reducing fatalities by a minimum of 50%. For him, it is totally unacceptable that more than one million people die on the roads and more than fifty million are injured. Following the declaration by the UN in 2011, the Federal Road Safety Commission (FRSC) set out as its response to adopt and domesticate the UN Action Plan by developing a number of programs suitable for every road user in the country by Nigeria Road Safety Strategy (NRSS) which is aimed to meet up with the UN declaration. But just like other policies in Nigeria, the response is slow (NRSS is planned for 2016-2020) and shows no signs of being effective.

Therefore, we must as citizens do our best to come up with other plans, actions or systems that will not just reduce but also prevent these crashes for the good of the whole nation.