Road mishaps claim over six precious human lives every day in Sri Lanka – Minister Dr. Gunawardhana

In conjunction with the International Victims’ Day which fell on the 19th of November, a relief programme for the victims of road accidents implemented by the National Road Safety Council was conducted under the patronage of the Minister of Transport, Highways and Mass Media, Dr. Bandula Gunawardhana.

Under this programme, an amount of Rs. 3,750,000 was awarded to twenty-five victims who were permanently disabled due to road accidents.

In conjunction with the programme, a special lecture on accident and post-accident management was given by the Director of the Accident Unit of the Colombo National Hospital, Dr. A.I. Jagoda.

The Minister who spoke on this occasion, had the following to say; “This event is very important as an effective start for the formulation of a national programme for those who have become victims of road accidents. Special national focus on the people who are injured and die in accidents is a problem that needs to be solved nationally. More than six precious human lives are lost every day in Sri Lanka, due to road accidents. In a society where people struggle with life to survive, prevention of death due to road accidents is very important.

Based on that, there should be a national programme on the impact of total disability and partial disability on families and lives. When there is a problem about Cricket, a lot of national attention is paid to it. But the number of people who die and become disabled due to road accidents every day and national attention towards the programme to prevent those situations is very minimal. The mass media has a great responsibility to draw people’s attention to this. Therefore, especially, as the Minister in charge of mass media, I am giving instructions to State media institutions to prepare a special programme to raise awareness among the people about this as soon as possible.

Also, combining both Ayurvedic medicine and Western medicine, Ayurveda can play a big role in providing long-term medical treatment to people who become helpless due to road accidents. Therefore, it is hoped to have an urgent discussion for a programme to bring the disabled people to a better state of health by using Ayurveda centres with facilities like Meegoda, integrating western and local medical methods together with the Governor of the Western Province, the Minister in charge of Ayurveda, together with the Minister of Health.

Currently, the world is paying more and more attention to the use of electric vehicles. Instead of using fossil fuels, special attention is now being given to environmentally friendly, electric-powered tricycles, motorcycles, cars, buses and trains. We also hope to focus on modernizing the vehicle system with international standards and norms for the safety of people using the road and property.

Everyone should work together for a national programme to turn to an electric vehicle system while protecting the environment, reducing accidents, while lending a hand to the manufacturers and designers who have made innovations in this field, in the country.

Currently, the government has 84,247 vehicles. Out of these 47,074 that is, 56% are more than ten years old. Hence, these are most useful for garage owners, vehicle repairers, and spare parts dealers. It is a timely decision to sell all the vehicles older than ten years to the private sector in an auction and get the vehicles required for the government, on a rental basis from another party as needed without purchasing modern vehicles for the government. This will save the government a lot of money.

Even now, businessmen including tourist hotels in the private sector are getting vehicles on rental basis. Therefore, in order to maintain a good fleet of vehicles and to maintain a good road system, everyone must commit to making 2024 a year of reducing road accidents by developing the existing inter-coordination between the institutions. Transport Minister Lasantha Alagiyawanna, Transport Ministry Additional Secretary L. H. Thilakaratne, Chairman of the National Road Safety Council Malith Jayathilaka, Sri Lanka Police officers and a large number of people were present at this event.

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