Death Traps On Wheels…
It is not uncommon to find death traps on wheels along the streets of Accra and almost all the towns of Ghana yet there is a Motor Transport and Traffic Directorate (MTTD); an agency under the Ghana Police Service responsible for road safety in the country.
One needs not to be a trained officer of the MTTD to notice such death traps yet they continue to increase in numbers and the killers behind these wheels boldly drive through every police check point without fear of arrest.
Some of such vehicles do not have any form of driving lights yet they move around at night, causing a complete danger to other motorists.
Some have completely worn out tyres that have become as smooth as a baby’s butts yet they carry all manner of cargo and drive at break neck speed. Some even carry passengers.
Some of the vehicles are simply unfit for the roads yet for some reasons, they continue to evade the arrest of the MTTD officers.
How exactly the law-breaking drivers manage to evade arrest is a question for the gods. They include both licensed and unlicensed drivers incapable of comprehending road signs.
How they got their licenses is another question for the gods.
The outcome is a terrible statistics on road crashes that have deprived families of their bread winners and left children and women with permanent deformities.
Yet no one seems to be concerned to act with a sense of urgency to get these death traps off our roads.
The Thunder agrees that drivers and road users ought to be responsible enough to do the right thing and ensure their safety and the safety of other road users is secured.
But we are also of a firm conviction that the MTTD was not established just for the fun of it.
It is the unit of the Police Service that should be blamed for the increasing lawlessness on our roads and we call on them to be a bit more proactive in the discharge of their professional duties.
Humans would not stop doing the wrong things until there is a clearly established preventive measure or punishment to serve as a deterrent.
Personnel of the MTTD are mostly the first police man to be seen in any part of the country yet they are the least respected by motorists and road users.
It is not uncommon to hear very wide spread reports that they could easily be compromised in the line of their duties.
It is this phenomenon that they could easily be compromised that has emboldened the recklessness on our roads.
Sad as it is, the actions or inactions of some police personnel from the MTTD has created a rather negative image for the service. This must change.
It must change else the recklessness on the roads would not reduce.
The recklessness is leading to deaths; not only the deaths of the culprits but also the deaths of other innocent and law-abiding road users and motorists.
Something has to be done about the situation and done with a sense of urgency.
