When accidents and other tragedies happen, the shock, sorrow and anger are often followed shortly by the need to lay blame on somebody’s bloody f****n’ feet.
In the wake of the jaw-dropping calamity that befell about 8 vehicles and Motorcycles that were smashed by a trailer at the traffic lights in Bukoto near Kiira Road police station as they waited to be released on Wednesday the 24th of April, we find ourselves wondering who is to blame and who is responsible for the 2 deaths and about 26 people admitted to Mulago hospital with serious injuries.
Just recently, on 26th April 2019, 6 people including the Resident District Commissioner of Koboko District, Isaac Kawooya and his wife in the morning perished in a despicable accident along Kampala- Masaka highway.
The accident happened in the morning at Mpambire swamp when a Toyota Premio registration number UAZ 417D allegedly collided with a trailer at around 6am. The RDC, his wife and others according to Koboko Municipality MP and Investment Minister, Ms Evelyn Anite, were returning from Mbarara where the RDC had gone to join the president at a Muslim function.
Although investigations are still ongoing, they suspect speeding was the cause of the accident.
Others who died on the spot included; Hajji Abdallah Muwonge from Mbarara, a lady called Aharizira Christine and a Rwandan national.
Close to a year back, another heart breaking calamity that befell the passengers of a Gaaga Bus that crashed into a tractor and cargo lorry on Friday the 25th of May in Kiryandongo, leaving 22 dead and the scores injured left many hearts bleeding and wondering; ‘But Why?’.
Blame serves a few purposes more than giving us something to aim our anger at. Blame tells us why whatever happened, happened. Blame tells us who or what made whatever happened, happen. But most importantly, blame gives us hope that if we find the reason for it happening; whatever happened need not happen again.
Initial investigations point to over-speeding, recklessness and vehicles in dangerous mechanical condition as the cause of most accidents? Now, this is usually the part where we decry a culture of recklessness on our roads, and ask the government to fix our roads or do an unspecific “something” to stop drivers being so recklessness, but then over-look the other factor. Poor mechanical conditions of the cars involved.
Would this accident still have happened if these cars had all been in tip-top shape? Possibly
There are so many unpredictable factors that combine themselves at the worst time to catalyse an accident that it is difficult to say one thing in particular is responsible for a car crash. However, having a mechanically sound vehicle ensures that whatever unforeseen event occurs on the road (as they often do), a driver is in the best position to mitigate the situation and even avoid the accident.
With so many factors that could cause a road accident, including recklessness of fellow road users, and bad road infrastructure, one ought to at least ensure that the vehicle in which they travel is in the best possible condition it can be. But, so many people often forget that.
When our team took to the streets and asked what could be the cause of the increasing cases of road accidents on our roads, 60% of the people blamed it on the bad roads in the country whereas 25% blamed it on recklessness on the part of the drivers and cyclists, especially boda-boda riders. 13% blamed it on what they called the failed mandatory vehicle inspection program. 2% blamed it on spiritual aspects.
There is no telling when that really bad pot-hole will get fixed, or when taxis will stop careening on and off the road without warning, but is all that in our control? No, but the faulty brakes that have been squealing for a week are, and are our best hope for survival in case a taxi veers back onto the road as we are avoiding a deep pothole.
There is no forgetting as well that Uganda has had a mandatory vehicle inspection program run by SGS since 2016, with an estimated 33,000 cars checked since. But at less than 10% of Uganda’s over 300,000 cars inspected, poor mechanical conditions as a cause of accidents are far from being a problem we have dealt with.
Now, speaking of spiritual, we have some times heard of (if you haven’t heard, you might soon hear) the illuminati’s, the angry ‘Emisambwa’(simply referred to as spirits) and blah blah blah.
Sophia Namutebi Alias Mama Fina, Uganda’s Famous traditional healer has spilled fresh secrets regarding some of these tragic incidents. Mama Fina attributes the increasing number of accidents to deforestation, arguing that the ‘Emisambwa’ are angry since, among other things, they nolonger have where to rest on the roadsides (check out the uploaded audio).
The problem with looking to apportion blame when a tragedy happens is that we quickly look outside ourselves and place responsibility there, than to look at ourselves and see whether we could have avoided a similar calamity; what could we be doing in our own lives to ensure our safety? What is in our control? Only when we all collectively take responsibility for what we can control to avoid accidents (whether it is our behaviour, or mechanical condition of our vehicles) will we really see an end to the kind of horrors that befall passengers of not only, on road , but also on water and air.
