Opps..Sikap!

Road accident is a tragedy. In Malaysia it is clearly one of the major causes of death and injury. Road accident statistics (surf http://keselamatanjalan.jkr.gov.my/) says it all. Though government via the Ministry of Transport (MOT), Commercial Vehicles Licensing Board (CVLB), RTD, and Police traffic has come out with lots of campaign, Ops and even launched the Road Safety Plan 2006 – 2010, numbers of fatalities due to road accident is still high.

Since the establishment of the Road Safety Plan back in March 2006, government has put numerous effort to reduce the number of fatality. By 2010 the government targeted to reduce the fatality to (MOT 2006): -

a) 10 fatalities per 100,000 populations;
b) 2 fatalities per 10,000 registered vehicles (3.7 in 2007 which is considered higher as compared to Indonesia 2.6, Singapore 2.5, the Philippines at 2.1 and Brunei 1.8); and
c) 10 fatalities per billion vehicles kilometer traveled (VKT) by year 2010.

Government has also put a constant effort to ensure the good road condition especially in the State highways throughout the country…..off course via abundant of taxpayer’s money (a good plan needs a practical implementation too. Otherwise a plan will just be another plan).

Police traffic has outlined a concept called 4As to ensure reduction in fatalities at Ops Sikap XX: Attitude, Ability, Action and Achievement. The first Attitude should reflect people’s commitments towards ensuring zero accident. Ability and Action refers to the police traffic’s ability to plan, analyze while persistently enforce good traffic manners. Finally, Achievement i.e. Zero accident of road user. Clearly, the 4A concept requires both public and government effort.

Road safety campaigns, you name it. Just to recap few as follows…

Personally, I tend to disagree with people who blame government for every failure in Ops Sikap or any other road safety campaigns. You may want to ask yourself (from the people perspective) why road accident is still high in the Malaysian roads? Federal traffic chief, Datuk Abdul Aziz Yusof in his comments on Ops Sikap XX said 80% of road accident was due to motorist losing control of their vehicles, overtaking, speeding in an odd weather condition and in some cases, motorist takes up two lanes of the road without the intent to overtake.

I say, road safety should be seen in a wider context than just simply accident prevention. It should be made as a culture, impart it to our younger generation right from their early years. Any form of racing games should also be banned from children (huhu!!). Otherwise, Opps…its Sikap rupanya!!

Anyway, more vehicles are expected to be on the road at the end of this month during the long break of Aidiladha. Please Malaysian drivers (including myself), motorcyclist and pedestrian, be extra careful!

P/s - I remember the Indiana RTD’s motto “Drive Defensively” in urging drivers to 100% concentrates on their driving at any time, all times.