THE SOUTH African government wants to reduce the country’s horrific road traffic accident rate by charging drivers who cause loss of life with murder if they knowingly break the rules.
Speaking at the launch of South Africa’s 2012 Easter Arrive Alive campaign on Sunday evening, transport minister S’bu Ndebele, who lost his own son in a car crash 18 years ago, said the number of road deaths in South Africa was unacceptably high.
According to the country’s Road Traffic Management Corporation, statistics show that between 35 and 40 people die daily on South Africa’s roads – or more than 14,500 people each year.
“If you jump the robot [traffic light] or overtake others [and your actions result in people dying], and you thought about what you are doing, you have to be charged with murder, and that is what we are going to be pushing for,” the minister explained.
Road deaths have been extremely high for a number of years despite ongoing state-sponsored campaigns that try to get drivers to be more careful.
However, a number of horrific accidents over the past 12 months have brought the issue starkly into focus for the public, as they involved the deaths of multiple schoolchildren caused by drivers who showed a blatant disregard for the rules of the road.
Last August Western Cape taxi driver Jacob Humphreys overtook a row of five stopped cars at a level crossing in Cape Town and proceeded over the tracks, despite safety signals warning him that a train was on its way.
The train hit the taxi, killing 10 of the children he was taking to school and seriously injuring four others. Earlier this month a similar incident involving a taxi driver in Soweto occurred in which five schoolchildren were injured.
Humphreys was subsequently charged with murder, and last week he was convicted and given a 20-year prison sentence.
Mr Ndebele pointed out that Humphreys’s fate in the high court was proof the state would no longer tolerate road deaths caused by drivers who disregard the rules of the road.
“Gone are the days when people used to escape the consequences of their irresponsible actions. There is a need for all of us to draw a clear distinct line between culpable homicide and murder.
“We are now working with the department of justice that the law must change. They will be calling a seminar for prosecutors and magistrates, and we will now charge people with murder,” he warned.
