Central Region road accidents claim 138 lives

One hundred and thirty-eight (138) people were killed in road crashes in the Central Region last year, the Motor Traffic and Transport Unit(MTTU) of the Ghana Police Service has revealed.

The year preceding recorded 129.

Last year’s figure was made up of 109 males and 29 females with 28 of them being below 18 years and 110 above 18 years.

The accidents also left 1,149 persons with various degrees of injuries as against 811 in 2015.

Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) Emmanuel Ofori, MTTU Regional Commander, who made this known to Ghana News Agency (GNA), indicated that a total of 789 road crashes were recorded last year as against 729 in the previous year, indicating an increase of 60 cases.

He said a total of 125 of the cases were fatal, 224 were serious while 440 were minor cases with pedestrian knock downs increasing to 228 as against 141 in 2015.

 Of the cases, 538 were commercial vehicles, 494, private, while 136 involved motor bikes.

He said human errors, such as speeding, over loading, drink driving as well as reckless driving continued to be the major causes of road traffic crashes in the Region.

ASP Ofori said the MTTU would continue to collaborate with the Road Safety Commission and other road safety stakeholders to embark on regular and constant educational campaign to ensure that the laws were enforced.

He said although the collaboration with road safety stakeholders had led to some significant reduction in road accidents in the Region in the previous years, the figures were still alarming and called for an intensified collaboration to further bring the figures down.

ASP Ofori called on drivers, passengers, pedestrians and other road users to be cautious when using the road.

Source: GNA