Road accidents down by 57 percent in five years

Road accidents have decreased by more than half in the past five years, according to the police, who attribute the development to people becoming more aware of safety.

Road accidents dropped by 57 percent from 3,988 in 2018 to 1,720 in 2022, according to a recent National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) report.

Dubbed Tanzania in Figures, the report also shows a decrease in the number of injured people by 45.68 percent to 2,278 while the number of deaths dropped by 19.2 percent to 1,545 people during the same period.

Police say the trend is the outcome of ongoing efforts to curb road accidents across the country as more people get relevant education.

The Police Force head of legal affairs and global road safety instructor, Mr Deus Sokoni, said sensitisation of road safety awareness among the public has been a significant secret to the decline of road accidents.

According to him, before 2016, the number of road accidents was high, with recorded cases ranging between 16,000 and 20,000 annually.

"We strongly believe in emphasising safety for every road user. When we provide awareness to everyone, we believe that many people will be obedient to the laws. We believe that when every group or road user becomes aware of safety and what is going on with road safety, it even becomes easier for us to enforce the traffic laws," he told The Citizen.

Mr Sokoni stressed that the force is in the final stages of coming up with a National Strategic Plan for road safety, which will help to further drop the rate of accidents in the country.

"The draft has been prepared, and it has been disseminated to a number of ministries and other stakeholders," he said.

He said it becomes easy to implement the law when there is political will, adding that so far, police have had to provide road safety awareness to Members of Parliament (MPs, government officials, and government drivers) because this group was increasingly getting involved in road accidents.

According to him, police have also come up with a project called Junior Patrol, which involves teaching primary and secondary school teachers to become trainers, teach fellow teachers and teach students about road safety.

Amend Tanzania, an NGO that advocates for policies to ensure safety, said collaborative efforts with the government, stakeholders and other non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have enabled the reduction of road accidents in the country.

"The general population is also more aware of concerns concerning road safety and the safety of their lives, yet additional efforts are required to collaborate in order to continue reducing the number of accidents," said Amend Tanzania programme officer, Ms Neema Swai.

The organisation’s manager, Mr. Simon Kalolo, told The Citizen that they developed, implemented and evaluated evidence-based programmes to reduce the incidence of road accidents across the country and sub-Saharan Africa.

"By collaborating with the government, Amend has been able to fix pedestrian infrastructure on various primary school premises across the county," he said.