Programme Director, MEC Faith Mazibuko
Deputy Minister of Transport: Mrs. Chikunga

MECs of Roads and Transport Dr. Ismail Vadi

The Executive Mayor of Ekurhuleni, Cllr. Mondli Gungubele

Fellow South Africans

We are gathered here today as people from all walks of life at a time when the entire nation is deeply saddened by the rising deaths on our roads. We are moved not only by the loss of lives, but equally by the devastating effect that road carnage has on survivors of road crashes and the families of unfortunate victims. We have come to better appreciate its impact on those involved, directly or indirectly.

This Road Safety Summit is convened on the 4th day into the 2013 Transport Month. This is the first National Summit on Road Safety, the structure of which is deliberately designed to give effect the ruling party’s battle cry, “working together we can do more”.

The October Transport month affords us an opportunity to take stock of and celebrate our successes in the transport sector, to reflect on challenges encountered and to collectively devise solutions to such challenges.

Notwithstanding the strides and successes in providing improved transport services in most parts of the country, statistics reveal that the rate at which people are being killed on our roads (40 per day) is countering the milestones that we have made in developing our transport system.

The major accidents witnessed this year alone are a stark reminder of the need to form partnerships to address road carnage. I thought I would share with you information on some of the crashes in which many people were killed on the spot, with most of them being public transport commuters. This would be known to many of you present here.

On 15 March this year, 23 people died in a bus crash on the Hex River Pass near De Doorns in the Western Cape. Two of the dead were children. About 80 congregants of the Twelve Apostles Church were on board when the crash happened.

Seven maidens, two of their minders and a bus driver were killed in a crash at about 5pm on Sunday 1st of September, on their way home from the annual reed dance. The accident happened on the section of the R66 highway near Melmoth, where the bus overturned.

It was on September the 5th when we witnessed another horrific crash claiming the lives of 24 people in Pinetown, after a truck rammed into four minibus taxis and two cars at the M13 and Richmond Road intersection.

During the time of the Pinetown disaster, I visited the hospital where I was shocked to learn that of the 10 struggling victims in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU), 9 were as a result of motor vehicle accidents.

Nothing could have prepared me for what I witnessed after visiting the crash scene, survivors in the ICU and the clip we have just seen.

A day later, a bus overturned at the R66 and R34 intersection in the very province of KwaZulu-Natal, killing 9 people.

In the evening of 13 September, another fatal crash on the N7 close to Citrusdal, involving a minibus taxi and two vehicles, killed 8 people, leaving 3 in a very critical condition.

Adding these figures gives an indication of how many people we have lost on our roads in just a few months. These are just reported cases. A look into unreported cases may paint a more frightening picture.

The effects of road crashes are devastating. They impact negatively on the livelihoods of families and the socioeconomic fabric of the country. Families are robbed of their breadwinners. Those who remain behind face a bleak future without any source of income. Surviving victims are faced with lifetime incapacity to fend for themselves due to severe injuries and disability.

Research indicates that at least R306 billion is lost to the South African economy annually as a result of road crashes. This cost includes loss of manpower and skills, emergency medical services, post-crash services such as road repairs and clean-up operations and compensation paid out to victims.

The Road Accident Fund alone pays out at least R15 billion to victims of road crashes each year. Of this amount, R1 billion is for continued medical support to those who sustain injuries. Through its Community Outreach Programme, “RAF on the Road”, the Fund is able to swiftly register and settle claims on location.

It is important that we thoroughly assess and fully comprehend the cost of road crashes to the economy and society in general.

On 18 September, I relayed to the nation some of the necessary and immediate interventions aimed at addressing road carnage. A number of commitments were made to the nation and there is a greater need for all of us to ensure that we fulfil these.

This Road Safety Summit comes as a watershed moment for all stakeholders to participate through listening, learning and collectively strategizing on how best can we address the carnage on our roads, notwithstanding various programmes and interventions that have been and are currently implemented.

The theme that will guide deliberations at this Summit, “Together Championing Road Safety 365 Days”, indicates that there is work being done in championing road safety, but we need to redouble our efforts in making road safety everyone’s responsibility throughout the year.

I would like to see us emerge from this Summit with concrete, doable and effective plans. I am hoping that we can identify quick wins that would have a major impact.

Road Safety has a long history in our country and it has undergone various stages. We come from the era of the 2006 Road Safety Strategy which has been implemented over the years, but in the process, it has been surpassed by new developments.
In July 2009, Transport Ministers from the African continent attended the International Africa Make Roads Safe Conference held in Dar es Salaam. During the conference, they committed themselves to championing Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), particularly the one of improving road safety and halving the number of road fatalities by the year 2015.

At the first Global United Nations’ Ministerial Conference on Road Safety held in Moscow on 2 March 2010, road safety was further escalated as a challenge requiring the urgent attention of governments, worldwide. Governments around the world took the historic decision to intensify efforts over the next decade to address road carnage.

The United Nations’ General Assembly resolution declared the period from 2011 to 2020 as the Decade of Action for Road Safety. South Africa is one of the member states that have committed themselves to the realization of what is targeted by this programme.

The overall goal is to stabilize and reduce the forecast level of road traffic fatalities around the world by 2020. As South Africa, we also committed to reduce the number of road fatalities by half by 2020. The rate at which road fatalities happen in the country presents an adversity in reaching those targets.

It is in this spirit that this Summit has been convened, to ensure that as a country, we make good progress on the commitment we have made to the United Nations – that of halving road deaths by 50% in 2020. As Government, we cannot do it alone. This Summit is thus convened with this in mind and the need to form strong public private partnerships in dealing with road carnage.

There is a greater need for collaboration and partnerships with key stakeholders such as Government departments and their entities, business, particularly manufacturers of motor vehicles and tyres, public transport operators, driving school operators, road safety NGOs, vehicle rental and fleet companies and the broader society, in being responsive to the scourge that faces us.

This Summit must build on the 2006 Road Safety Strategy and incorporate fresh thinking guided by the UN Decade of Action for Road Safety Programme and its pillars, which are central to the discussions we are about to engage in. These Pillars are (1) Road Safety Management, (2) Safer Roads and Mobility, (3) Safer Vehicles, (4) Safer Road Users and (5) Post-Crash Response.

Throughout the duration of this Summit, our engagements should be indicative of our resolve to fight against road carnage by investigating pragmatic and sustainable interventions aimed at curbing the spate of road crashes.

This summit must be guided by the three pillars of road safety that form the core of government's mandate of making roads safer, namely: Enforcement, Engineering and Education. The areas of focus would include reviewing existing legislation under the National Road Traffic Act, road structural challenges and educational campaigns aimed at raising awareness about road safety hazards among motorists, passengers and pedestrians alike.

Law enforcement is an exclusive competency of the State. This is an equally shared responsibility among National, Provincial and Local spheres of Government. The primary intention of this function is to enforce the law against violations, penalize perpetrators and seek to deter offenders from repeating offences.

It is a well-known fact that we do not have sufficient law enforcement officers to police every corner of our country, but this cannot be taken as an excuse for frequent road deaths or disregard for rules of the road. The Department of Transport is currently engaged in exploratory inter-governmental discussions regarding the human resource needs of traffic law enforcement authorities.

Moving violations frequently emerge as the common cause of collisions of vehicles. The Department believes that part of the remedial actions for law enforcement authorities should be to increase traffic personnel to address glaring challenges such as dangerous overtaking, speed and other dangerous causes.

Law enforcement is a challenging responsibility to discharge due to several attendant factors such as capacity constraints (as I have earlier alluded to) and corruption, among others. The practice of corruption and bribery is not only a gross act of criminality but it's a deed with potential fatal consequences. This practice permeates across a number of critical functions in the transport sector that contribute to a high number of fatalities. Corruption is prevalent in vehicle licensing testing centres and driving school operators conducting themselves in ways that are in violation of the law.

It remains a concern that untrained and unqualified drivers are issued with licences. Only a learner driver who has received adequate training should be booked for driver's license testing. Processes must not be circumvented in a bid to make extra revenue at the expense of people's lives. It is worth noting that several interventions are already underway within the legislative framework that governs conduct on our roads.

These include proposed amendments to the National Road Traffic Act to introduce a two-year probation period for first time applicants of driver's licenses and the reduction of the legal alcohol content limit to 0,05 % for drivers of normal vehicles and 0,02% for professional drivers, among others.

Transport operators should not pay lip service to vehicle safety and roadworthiness. Most of the vehicles that are involved in crashes are not roadworthy and blame is often shifted to drivers when operators know very well that they did not take their vehicles for road safety inspections.

In cases where they did, unroadworthy vehicles are certified as roadworthy. In some instances, transport operators do not even verify the validity of the drivers who operate their vehicles.

Sound and world-class infrastructure, as provided by the Government, can only make sense if our road users respect and use that infrastructure in a way that benefits our economy and better our lives. Road users must be responsible, considerate and patient when using the road networks.

In line with the National Development Plan, the ANC government aims to uplift the well-being of its citizens through sustainable transport infrastructure systems that are safe and sound. This is premised on an understanding that roads in bad conditions contribute to road collisions.

Through the Provincial Road Maintenance Grant, commonly known as S’hamba Sonke, we have introduced innovative ideas on acquiring external advise and skills that would see us adequately responding to the challenges confronting us.

In an attempt to strengthen capacity at provincial level, the Department will ensure that each province has a dedicated service provider as and when external support is needed to address the issue of road maintenance.

We have set aside funds to the tune of R8.7 billion for this financial year 2013/14 to allocate to provinces through the Division of Revenue Act, for the rehabilitation and maintenance of roads. This allocation is additional to the budget set aside for the provincial departments by the provincial government.

I urge all those who form part of the road construction value chain to always prioritize safety for every road they build, from design to the actual construction of the road. We need to strictly adhere to the set norms and standards within the road construction industry.

Further to the legislative changes will be the national rollout of AARTO and its inherent demerit points. In pursuit of the commitment to improve the implementation of the AARTO, a number of innovations were included in the draft AARTO Amendment Bill, published for comment in Government which included amongst others:
Establishment of appeal tribunal;

Administration of rehabilitation programmes, including the provision of community service at government mortuaries and hospital trauma wards for victims of road crashes; and

The service of documents by electronic means in addition to the traditional methods of service by registered mail and in person.
The implementation of the AARTO and the Points Demerit System, is but one of the mechanisms geared at achieving critical success of increasing and sustaining road safety in our country. They are not stand-alone programmes but part of a suite of proactive strategies for the improvement of road safety as a 365 day programme.

This approach will assist us in ensuring that we combine efforts of government at all three spheres, the private sector and civil society. We further believe that this watershed Summit will enable us to realize a collective national approach to a national problem.

Although government has the primary responsibility of ensuring safer roads, pragmatism will confirm that we all have a role to play, from drivers, fleet owners, passengers to pedestrians. Responsibility towards road safety doesn't only rest with the driver but other parties such as fleet owners, passengers and pedestrians.

We call upon the private sector and civil society to partner with us in this regard. We are aware that there are many non-governmental partners playing their part in their own way. We now want to recognize their efforts and create synergies between what government is doing and their tireless contribution.

We have since embarked on a programme aimed at introducing driving skills at school level. In partnership with the Department of Basic Education, we intend on “catching them young” and instil a culture of discipline and responsibility among future drivers.

It is our intention that every school leaver obtains a learner’s licence upon successful completion of matric. When they enrol in institutions of higher learning, they should receive driving lessons through electronic simulations to prepare them for the world of driving.

We are also seized with a task of improving our support to Road Safety Councillors who are doing sterling work in their respective communities with little appreciation and support. They remain our eyes and ears where we are unable to reach due to capacity constraints.

The partnership we have with the Public Transport industry on road safety is a good example of what we can achieve collectively. They have an on-going campaign called Hlokomela – which aims at educating taxi drivers about their responsibilities towards road safety.

We have an intergovernmental team that is giving undivided attention to law enforcement comprising National, Provincial and Local Authorities, and the relevant state entities.

Through the implementation of the 365 Days Road Safety Programme, the National Enforcement Rolling Plan and other initiatives we must fight a winning battle and commit to our targets of halving roads deaths by 2020.

This summit is requested and expected to propose other immediate interventions to address identified hazards where applicable to prevent recurrences of violations of the law. What is also important is the creation of a reliable data bank to assist us with forward planning and budgeting in tacking road carnage.

All these and other proposals are meant to support our efforts to have all-year 365 day road safety programmes as crashes happen daily and not confined to specific seasons. We do, however, acknowledge the continued need to multiply our efforts during peak traffic seasons such as festive and Easter holidays and mid-year vacations.

In closing, I would like to reiterate the responsibility that we hold. Every effective measure that we implement will save lives. Remember, too, that the responsibility does not lie on my head or the Department or just a small group of related agencies.

• Once again, I wish to remind you that this is a collective responsibility and we are in this together. It is incumbent on all of us and all our efforts must be harmonised to be effective.

Our victory to reduce road deaths is victory for our economy and the nation as a whole.

I thank you.