New UN envoy aiming to reduce road carnage in East Africa

Jean Todt, the newly appointed United Nations special envoy for road safety. PHOTO | KEVIN KELLEY |

What you need to know:

  • Ban Ki-moon calls Jean Todt a "man of action".
  • The UN chief also said he is confident of Mr Todt's commitment to road safety.

NEW YORK

Road accidents and HIV/Aids will claim an equal number of lives in Africa by 2030, according to a projection by the World Health Organisation.

Yet far more public attention is paid to diseases such as Aids, Malaria and Ebola than to the death toll involving motor vehicles, observes Jean Todt, the newly appointed United Nations special envoy for road safety.

Mr Todt finds irony in that disproportionate response.

"There's still no vaccine for these diseases, but we know exactly how to prevent road deaths," Mr Todt said in an interview with the Nation.

That knowledge has been effectively applied in developed countries, he notes. The rate of road fatalities in Europe and North America has fallen sharply in the past 20 years as a result of improvements in infrastructure and vehicle design, along with public campaigns promoting safe driving.

In Africa, however, the number of road deaths continues to climb, although a few countries are reporting decreases.

Kenya is one such case.

There were 3,065 reported fatalities on Kenyan roads in 2010, according to WHO's most recent global report on road safety. The number dropped to 2,641 last year, Transport Cabinet Secretary Michael Kamau announced in January.

But little progress in saving road users' lives has been achieved in either Tanzania or Uganda.

President Jakaya Kikwete reported in his 2015 New Year message that 3,534 Tanzanians had been killed the previous year in road accidents. That figure is only slightly below the 3,582 deaths recorded in 2010.

Relative to population, Uganda has one of the world's highest rates of road fatalities, WHO says. Nearly 3,000 Ugandans died in accidents involving motor vehicles in 2013 — about the same as the total for 2010.

In addition to the personal losses suffered by many families in East Africa, the sub-region's economy is negatively affected by this large-scale loss of life.

Many of the victims are young adults who could have contributed to national development. East African countries also spend large amounts of money treating the tens of thousands of people injured in road accidents each year.

Pedestrians, motorcycle users and bicycle riders account for about half of the 1.3 million annual road deaths worldwide. The ratio is much higher in Kenya.

According to the statistics cited by Mr Kamau, last year's death toll of 2,641 Kenyans included 1,731 pedestrians and motorcyclists.

Mr Todt, a former rally driver who served as CEO of Italian sports car manufacturer Ferrari, says safety initiatives he will undertake are intended to benefit these especially vulnerable road users as well as drivers and their passengers.

'MAN OF ACTION'

But the European Federation of Road Traffic Victims recently suggested that Mr Todt's background does not equip him to serve as an effective advocate for walkers and bike riders.

"Mr Todt may well do a good job in his domain, the racing industry, but he is for us road victims not the right personality to be a credible neutral advocate for all road users, particularly the most vulnerable — pedestrians, cyclists and people with disabilities," the federation said in a May 4 statement.

In announcing Mr Todt's appointment to the unpaid post, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said of the French national, "He is a man of action — and he has been known as a man of speed."

The UN chief also said he is confident of Mr Todt's commitment to road safety.

During the May 5 interview in New York, Mr Todt displayed a checklist of "golden rules" for road safety that he says he hopes to distribute throughout the world. It urges drivers to "belt up, obey the speed limit, drive sober" and take other actions to ensure safety.

This checklist is part of an road-safety education initiative that Mr Todt says he will direct toward pedestrians and bicyclists as well as motorists.

Schools are to be the focus of that effort, he adds, suggesting that education authorities should require teachers to devote one hour a week to road-safety instruction.

Mr Todt, who currently serves as president of the International Automobile Federation, also plans to enlist the help of national bodies such as the Automobile Association of Kenya.

Stricter enforcement of laws is another of Mr Todt's objectives. He acknowledges, however, that this will be difficult to achieve in countries such as Kenya where police corruption is widespread.

Mr Todt will also seek to persuade national leaders in Africa to give higher priority to public transportation as a way of reducing reliance on cars. He says he will work to create "more effective relationships" with transportation decision-makers.

Most of all, Mr Todt adds, "We need to build a culture [in Africa] that emphasises road safety."

If that occurs, he adds, there will be a good chance of meeting the goal he has set of a 50 percent reduction in road fatalities by 2030. As many as 50,000 lives could consequently be saved in Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda during the next 15 years.