By Aideloje Ojo
Minna
At least 147 persons were killed in road traffic accidents in Niger state over the past nine months, the Acting Sector Commanding of the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC), Nma Magana, has said.
He stated this yesterday at a press briefing to mark the 2016 African Road Safety Day and World Day of Remembrance for Traffic Victims held in Minna.
He said that 191 persons died in road traffic accidents in 2015, adding that most of the crashes were due to over speeding and reckless driving.
According to statistic provided by the acting sector commander, 361 road crashes were recorded from January to September this year out of which 74 were fatal and 915 injured.
In 2015, the state according to the statistic recorded 479 road crashes out of which 115 were fatal and 1,256 persons injured.
He regretted that despite the high rate of road accidents in the state, no driver had install speed limit device in their vehicles, adding that the commission will start enforcement of the rule from February, 2017.
He said that the shift in the enforcement date from this month to next year was due to poor compliance nationwide, adding that “the commission has decided to embark on more sensitisation to educate the people on the programme.
He said: “No single vehicle has complied with the speed limit device installation despite bringing to them vendors of the devices to educate commercial vehicles for compliance. Enforcement proper will start 1st February, 2017 and we are going to do more aggressive enlightenment because it will help reduce the number of crashes to a barest minimum”.
