Corps Marshal of the Federal Road Safety
Corps, Osita Chidoka, said on Wednesday that he had written to the
Managing Director of Toyota Nigeria Limited over high frequency of
crashes involving Toyota buses, especially the Hiace brand.
Chidoka said extensive investigations
and analysis of commuter vehicles carried out by the FRSC between
2007-2012, showed that Toyota Hiace buses were involved in 1,844
accidents.
He said 31 percent of bus accidents within the period also resulted in fire incidents.
The FRSC boss, who spoke at a
sensitisation programme on speed limiting devices in Abuja, stressed
that the situation was unacceptable to his organisation.
He said the study indicated that road
traffic crashes involving buses had been on the increase since 2007 and
that available data showed an average yearly increase of 126 crashes
involving Toyota Hiace buses, representing 48 per cent of the total
number of buses involved in accidents.
He noted that Nigeria started recording high Toyota Hiace crashes in August 2010.
“It is on record that Toyota Hiace YH3
buses were recalled in Australia as a result of fire in 1990 and
recently in 2012. The 1990 safety recall closed August 26, 2010, the
period Nigeria started recording high Toyota Hiace crashes involving
fire incidents. The corps has therefore written to the Managing Director
of Toyota to bring this menace to their attention,” he said.
The Corps Marshall advised commercial
bus owners to install speed limiting devices in their vehicles and obey
stipulated speed limits while plying the roads.
Chidoka said the FRSC had also written
to the management of Young Shall Grow Motors over the frequent
involvement of their buses in crashes, saying the company’s buses were
involved in 32 crashes which resulted in 71 deaths and 93 injuries
between January 2012 and June 2013.
He said that the FRSC was carrying out a
full audit of safety processes of the transport company, spanning its
drivers, vehicles, and company policies to ascertain their compliance
with minimum safety standards.
The FRSC, Chidoka said, was collecting
data on another transport firm, Peace Mass Transit, and would also
conduct safety audit on the company.
He noted that the PMT and the ABC
transport company had voluntarily commenced the installation of speed
limiters, which he described as an effective means of preventing speed
violation and resultant consequences, in their buses.
Secretary to Government
of the Federation, Senator Pius Anyim said there was a need to work
together to stop speed violation by motorists, adding that the Federal
Government believed that speed limiting devices in commercial vehicles
and trucks would reduce road crashes in the country.
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Chidoka should go and sleep - first let him tell Nigerians the ratio of Toyota vehicles in Nigeria to other makes, the ratio of Toyota vehicles in use for commercial purposes to other makes also and he should tell us if the Toyota vehicles he is talking about are also sold to users in other countries. I am sure he (Chidoka) is only out to grab some money from Toyota so as to shut his mouth, I don't think he is qualified to rate any vehicle , Toyota for that matter, for reliability. He should direct his energy to the recklessness of our drivers and the bad roads in the country instead of trying to rubbish the world's No.1 auto firm like Toyota.
ReplyDeleteThumb up for u jare,our drivers remove d speedometer demsefs,bad maintenance of d vehicle,chopped break pad,over speeding,bad road and drinking,using phone by d drivers,text msges while driving,no fire extiguisher,instead if dem to checkmate all dese dey busy booking u and collecting bribes.
DeleteYou Nigerians are difficult to satisfy. FRSC has given simply a statistics of their observations on motor accidents over a given period. They stand a better chance to draw conclusions since they have d necessary data at their disposal. You have rightly said Toyota is a reputable vehicle manufacturer, which is a known fact. But Australia withdrew a brand of their products from their country not withstanding their reputation. You will also remember the brake problem associated with one of their CAMRY models sometime ago. They as other humans are prone to errors. The FRSC has been given a responsibility, pls let them live up to it. If you must criticize pls do so constructively. The language the last speaker at 8.45am used suggests he is the one to shut his trap,& go to sleep. He may well be the one not qualified to contribute in this issue & next time tell us your name. The problem with those buses as I can understand from the given statistics may just be an absence of speed limit devices as our drivers abuse the ability the bus has to speed. So it is not out of place for FRSC to write Toyota company requesting for this to be done from the factory.....Chris Abara.
ReplyDeleteI'm dissapointed at Chidoka.Doesn't he know that 95% of accidents are being caused by our reckless drivers,and not TOYOTA? He should also be informed that 95% of the commercial buses on the roads are Toyota brands.Why expect mercedes,mazda etc to have a greater frequency of accident involvement?
ReplyDeleteChidoke shld go and sleep and tell Govt to repair the road and stop witch hunting toyota ok
ReplyDeleteThe statistics is bound to be so because Toyota hiace is the most popular brand for commercial purpose both for inter and intra states. in addition to this road safety should concentrate more on training, retraining and awareness creation for our drivers, they are very reckless in all ramifications. How on earth will see traffic jam and never think of how to solve but to compound it, fish brains
ReplyDeleteYou anonymous at 11 a.m. must be an FRSC mumu or Chidoka's brother. The withdrawal of brands you are talking about are quite distinct from our situations here. This is a country where FRSC is out there stopping brand new cars on the roads and asking from drivers if their brake lights, reverse lights are working while looking the other way when rickety trucks and buses filled with goods and passengers pass by. Why would there not be accidents? and like one commentator said above, 95% of the buses on our roads are Toyota models, while 95% of road accidents are caused by reckless driving, bad roads, FRSC not ensuring that rickety vehicles are kept off the roads as they collect bribes from them, etc.
ReplyDeleteIs it the bad that also caused the consistence fire outbreak noticed in the survey of the toyota buses?my naija pple are always supa funny... Odun Tutu.
ReplyDelete