Corps Marshal of the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), Dr Boboye Oyeyemi, has said that 38 per cent of all African road traffic deaths are from pedestrians.
Oyeyemi stated this in a presentation on Non-Motorised Transportation (NMT) at the General Assembly of the West African Road Safety Organisation (WARSO) in Dakar, Senegal.
The Corps Public Education Officer, Mr Bisi Kazeem, reported the presentation in a statement issued in Abuja on Wednesday.
Kazeem quoted Oyeyemi as saying that globally, 23 per cent of road traffic deaths involved motorcyclists; 22 per cent, pedestrians; five per cent, cyclists, 31 per cent, motorists and 19 per cent, unspecified road users.
The FRSC boss explained that 84 per cent of the roads in low-income and middle-income countries where pedestrians were present carried traffic at 40 km/h and above.
According to him, most of the roads in those societies have no footpaths, and where the footpaths exist, there are issues of “encroachment, truncation and abuse/misuse by motorists.
In addition, there is lack of protective features that totally segregate pedestrian lanes to prevent their usage by other road users, he noted.
These, in addition to speeding by motorists that knock them down, account for the high rate of road traffic deaths among pedestrians and cyclists.
“Pedestrians have a 90-per-cent chance of surviving car crashes at 30 km/h or below, but less than a 50-pe-cent chance of surviving impacts at 45 km/h or above.
“Pedestrians risk about 80-per cent chance of being killed at a collision speed of 50 km/h as opposed to a 10-per cent risk at a speed of 30 km/h,’’ Oyeyemi said.
The Corps Marshal said that bicycle was a “mobility of pride” at a particular point in Nigeria, used with pride by different classes of income earners.
However, the discovery of oil brought about prosperity especially for the working class and opened up the transportation space, he noted.
He stated that as more cars came in, bicycles began to disappear from the streets.
“Cars became spotlighted as symbols of strength, affluence and freedom; car owners now see those cycling and walking as less privileged.
“Those walking and riding bicycles now look forward to when to graduate from their mode.
“As communities grew economically with provision of infrastructure, there was no corresponding growth in NMT infrastructure, promotion, law, policies and usage by the upper class.”
Buttressing this further, the Corps Marshal stated that road traffic accidents cost the Nigerian economy about N3 billion annually.
The menace, he explained, decreased air quality owing to exhaust fumes, increased urban noise pollution that causes exhaustion and health implications, and sustained increase in its carbon foot print, among many other effects.
Oyeyemi added that about three per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries, including Nigeria, were lost to traffic congestion.
He said the Corps had put “result-yielding initiatives” in place to promote NMT in Nigeria and in the West African sub-region.
The initiatives, according to him, include establishment of a National Stakeholders Committee on Bicycle Transportation, design of the first National Cycling Policy and Strategy in Nigeria, and the ongoing work on a pedestrian manual. (NAN)