Navrongo (UE), Nov. 6, GNA – A total of 77 people have died and 190 sustained various degrees of injury from motor crashes in the Upper East Region, between January and September this year.
These were caused by 175 road crashes out of which 128 involved motorbikes while 47 cases were with cars.
Mr Abdulai Bawa Ghamsah, the Upper East Regional Manager of the National Road Safety Authority, said this at the inauguration of a Road Safety Task force in Navrongo to augment the service of the NRSA in the Kassena Nankana Municipality, Upper East Region.
He said the high rate of road crashes in the region was worrying and the Task Force was one of the measures taken by the authority to curb the situation.
“It is for this reason that the authority is moving from its advocacy and education mandate into regulating the transport sector and enforcing standards”, he added.
Mr Ghamsah said the mandate of the task force would include; road safety inspection, removal of ‘killer’ lamps on vehicles and motorbikes, decongestion of the Navrongo town roads and clear the pedestrians walk ways, check overloading by passenger cars and do pre-starter checks among others.
The TaskForce would also carry out road safety education and enforce road safety regulations and standards.
“There is too much indiscipline on the roads and the cold blood spilled on our roads should be a cause of worry to all Ghanaians”, he said.
He said many accident victims who were carried to the hospital did not usually have relatives by them to support and the taskforce would play that role while waiting for the relatives.
The Kassena/Nankana Municipal Chief Executive, Mr Joseph Adongo, pledged the support of the Assembly to the task force and asked them to be firm and not allow people in authority to influence their activities.
The Taskforce is drawn from the National road safety authority, the municipal Assembly, the Ghana police service, Ghana Fire Service, NADMO, Ambulance service and GPRTU.
Others are the Ghana Education service, the Ghana health Service, the Ghana Red Cross Society and the Street Sense Organisation.
GNA