To minimize death and injury on the roads, advocacy for more road safety measures is necessary. Advocacy is the act of arguing for action on behalf of a particular issue and the process of influencing, informing and assisting decision and policy makers. ASIRT Kenya has had various engagements with policy makers concerning road safety issues.
ASIRT Kenya in collaboration the International Institute of Legal Affairs (ILA) with other stakeholders is supporting the processing of the Traffic (Amendment )Bill 2014. This Bills seeks :
ASIRT Kenya's advocacy results include :
School safety program
A growing epidemic of road traffic crashes is devastating the next generation of children around the world. Every 30 seconds a person is killed in a road crash more than 3300 per day and over 1.2 million people per year die in road crashes worldwide. As many as 50 million are injured. Vulnerable road users are particular at risk, especially children. 500 children die every day in road crashes. In many Asian, African, and Middle Eastern countries between 40 and 50 per cent of people killed as a result of a road crash are pedestrians.
In Kenya adults and children are killed every day as a result of road crashes, and tens of thousands are injured, often suffering lifelong disability.
According to NTSA (National Transport and Safety Association) statistics, as at 24th of August 2015 Kenya has had 7607 people who have been involved in road crashes. Out of this 1,899 have died, 2,869 seriously injured and 2,619 slightly injured. Pedestrians take a large number with a total of 1,651 of those involved in road crashes. Children fall under this category.
Children are vulnerable road users. Anywhere where there is a potential for moving vehicles is a potentially dangerous traffic situation for children. This is because:
Are easily distracted and focus on only one aspect of what is happening
Are smaller and harder for drivers to see
Are less predictable than other pedestrians
Cannot accurately judge the speed and distance of moving vehicles
Cannot accurately predict the direction sounds are coming from
Are unable to cope with sudden changes in traffic conditions
Do not understand abstract ideas - such as road safety
Are unable to identify safe places to cross the road
Tend to act inconsistently in and around traffic
ASIRT Kenya's interventions towards child safety include:
Having school based road safety campaigns and education/ training programs.
ASIRT Kenya partners with various schools that are near roads and have a record of children being involved in road crashes. The programs involve training of teachers, parents and students.
Kasarani primary School
The children and staff were trained on safe use of roads and given reflective sashes to promote their visibility on roads
1. Promote localized road engineering to keep children safe on their school journey
This involves mapping out areas near schools and on the school route that are crash prone and have recorded high numbers of crash incidents. These areas require signage and road calming measures like speed bumps and rumble strips. ASIRT Kenya advocates and engages the relevant authorities to push for modification of the environment. This is done by partnering with relevant authorities in the country
Kasarani primary school
With partnership with City Council, a zebra crossing was put on the road at the entrance of the school to facilitate the safe crossing of roads.
Encourage and assist parents in forming street crossing patrols for their children.
Through partnering with schools and having access to PTAs, parents are advised to teach their children about road safety. This is sensitization during parents meetings and other interactive school activities.
With partnership with Usalama Watch Initiative, a person was stationed at the road with a stop and go sign (lollipop) to stop traffic and allow children to cross the road safely
Help communities get organized as a key part of creating the long-term cultural changes that will keep children safer on the roads.
Through sensitizing of people in the community. Plays and skits are carried out during weekends and school holidays that emphasize road safety in a fun way that will engage the children and general public in the accident prone areas.
Use of reflective material to promote visibility
Upon completion of the sensitization program, we then issue reflective materials to the children to aid in making them visible when on the roads. These have included sashes, bags and bracelets.
The UN has declared the second Global Road Safety Week from 6th May to 12th May, 2013. The Second Global Road Safety Week was dedicated to pedestrian safety. The week drew attention to the urgent need to better protect pedestrians worldwide. Speeding, drink driving, distracted driving by drivers and lack of obeying the law by pedestrians are some of the causes of the high fatality rates among pedestrian related crashes. In Kenya close to 50% of those that are killed on our roads are pedestrians.
To mark this week, ASIRT-Kenya joined the rest of the world by launching a visibility project for school children at Kasarani Primary school on 9th May, 2013 .Our interaction with schools in our daily work has proved that many children walk to and from school and are exposed to the dangers of dangerous driving common in Kenya. The main objective of this project is to reduce road injury and death rates among school children. We shall duplicate this in other schools.
The Long Short Walk is part of the Zenani Mandela Campaign. In support of UN Global Road Safety Week, The Long Short Walk aims to brought together people and groups from around the world to call for action to protect pedestrians. This involves committing oneself to ensure pedestrian safety by signing on a designed poster and walking on a stretch of a road.
ASIRT-Kenya participated in the Long Short Walk along Mombasa road on the 7th of May, 2013. They were joined by UNEP, Sameer Africa, Road Safety NGOs, school children and members of the public. The police closed off one lane on the busy Mombasa road to ensure that the walk was safe.
