- Njau noted that statistics indicated that all motorists were affected by the fatal accidents
- He said the authority was working with other stakeholders to address this
Image: FILE
Close to 1,700 people have died since January as a result of road accidents, this according to the latest data from the National Transport and Safety Authority (NTSA).
The authority noted that this was however a decrease compared to last year.
Compared to the same period last year, 1,756 people had died across the country’s roads.
According to the data, 1,679, people have died from January to date with pedestrians leading at 571 and motorcycle operators at 449.
This came as the authority partnered with ten counties across major roads in carrying out road safety campaigns targeting to reduce the number of fatal accidents in the country.
According to NTSA Director-General George Njau, they had increased signage along the major roads and continued improvement of the roads by fixing potholes.
Njau noted that statistics indicated that all motorists were affected by the fatal accidents adding that the authority was working with other stakeholders to address this.
Addressing the press in Naivasha during a meeting with the counties, he said that the authority was rolling out intelligence road management and safety system targeting PSVs.
“This system will be able to monitor and track PSV driver's speed and we shall be rolling it out in the next couple of days,” he said.
Under the programme with the counties, he said that NTSA would help them come up with transport committees and address the rising cases of accidents involving boda boda operators.
“We shall be sharing our proposals with the Council of Governors on areas where counties can improve in addressing issues of road safety at the grassroots level,” he said.
The authority's deputy director in charge of road safety Dr Duncan Kibogong pointed to pedestrians and motorcycle operators as the most affected by the fatal accidents.
He said that there was a decrease of four percent in the number of fatalities this year compared to the same period last year.
“As from January this year to date, we have lost a total of 1,679 people to road accidents compared to 1,756 in the same period last year with pedestrians and motorcyclists leading,” he said.
Kibogong added that a total of 8,098 people had been involved in accidents this year compared to 7,848 in the same span of time last year.
On his part, Nathaniel Ng’ang’a from Machakos County lauded the road safety programme by NTSA noting that it would go a long way in taming the rising cases of accidents.
“We are working with NTSA on how motorists can be assisted in processing required documents while training boda boda on road safety,” he said.