More than 3,600 people killed in road accidents in Uganda in 2020

 

A total of 3,633 people were killed in road accidents in Uganda in 2020, the Minister of Works and Transport Gen. Edward Katumba Wamala said on Friday.

Katumba made the revelation during a press conference in the capital Kampala, to launch the 6th Global Road Safety week.

“Uganda is still faced with road safety challenges. In 2020, the reported deaths due to road crashes were 3,663. That is a lot of lives lost in one year,” Wamala said.

Wamala noted that majority of the fatalities were persons aged between 17 and 35, an age group which he dubbed “the workforce of the nation”, and this was an issue which had now become a matter of concern for the country.

“The human and financial loss is very huge for a developing country like Uganda because when these lives are lost, that means these are taxpayers, then government will not be able to get taxes, (and) families lives will be shattered,” he said.

The minister further stated that the causes of these road crashes were known and preventable, with speeding accounting for 36 percent of all fatalities in Uganda in addition to being a factor in over 50 percent of crashes in Africa.

Wamala appealed to motorists in Uganda’s urban centres to maintain their speed at 30km/hr to reduce the number of road accidents in such areas.

“Research has shown that reducing speed by just five percent cuts fatalities by 30 percent. I, therefore, call upon each and every one of us to reduce the speed to 30km/hr in the urban centre.”

“If you love your country, if you love yourself, if you love your friends, if you love other road users, please drive at 30km/hr, maximum, in the urban centres.”

Fatal road crashes are frequent in Uganda and are often the result of negligent law enforcement, poorly serviced vehicles and potholed roads.

The figure is an increase from the ones posted in 2018 and 2019 when at least 3,194 and 3,407 people, respectively, were killed in road accidents, according to government data.