News / National
Police lobby for compulsory night driving lessons
13 Mar 2013 at 07:10hrs | Views
Police want government to introduce night driving lessons for all motorists, saying more road accidents are occurring at night.
According to recommendations made after analysing traffic accidents for the past festive season, police said most drivers are not trained to drive long distances at night resulting in more fatalities on the roads.
"Most fatal road accidents took place along the highways and at night, an indication that some drivers are either not experienced in long drives or night driving," police said yesterday.
During the past festive holiday, 260 people died in road accidents, the highest ever death toll recorded during Christmas holidays.
For police, the blame should be apportioned to government and drivers.
"There is need to speed up the dualisation process in the Harare-Beitbridge highway and the Harare-Bulawayo road. Local authorities and Zimbabwe National Roads Administration strive to deal with issues of potholes in urban roads and on the highways respectively," the police said in a statement.
"The general state of the roads countrywide is in dire need of attention. Most highways, especially the Harare-Beitbridge road is now too narrow to accommodate the ever increasing volume of traffic," police said.
According to police, the worst accident recorded during the festive season occurred in Manicaland where a truck carrying 63 people veered off the road claiming 17 lives and injuring 46.
The other major accident was recorded on Christmas Eve when eight people died while 14 others were injured when a minibus travelling to Kadhani-Mubaira veered off the road and overturned several times.
The police stated most of these accidents were caused by speeding, overtaking and turning errors.
Despite a heavy presence of police on most roads, the situation did not help at all and police critics say corruption contributed significantly to the road carnage recorded during the last holidays.
According to recommendations made after analysing traffic accidents for the past festive season, police said most drivers are not trained to drive long distances at night resulting in more fatalities on the roads.
"Most fatal road accidents took place along the highways and at night, an indication that some drivers are either not experienced in long drives or night driving," police said yesterday.
During the past festive holiday, 260 people died in road accidents, the highest ever death toll recorded during Christmas holidays.
For police, the blame should be apportioned to government and drivers.
"There is need to speed up the dualisation process in the Harare-Beitbridge highway and the Harare-Bulawayo road. Local authorities and Zimbabwe National Roads Administration strive to deal with issues of potholes in urban roads and on the highways respectively," the police said in a statement.
"The general state of the roads countrywide is in dire need of attention. Most highways, especially the Harare-Beitbridge road is now too narrow to accommodate the ever increasing volume of traffic," police said.
According to police, the worst accident recorded during the festive season occurred in Manicaland where a truck carrying 63 people veered off the road claiming 17 lives and injuring 46.
The other major accident was recorded on Christmas Eve when eight people died while 14 others were injured when a minibus travelling to Kadhani-Mubaira veered off the road and overturned several times.
The police stated most of these accidents were caused by speeding, overtaking and turning errors.
Despite a heavy presence of police on most roads, the situation did not help at all and police critics say corruption contributed significantly to the road carnage recorded during the last holidays.
Source - dailynews
