Frequent vehicle accidents on Nigerian roads claim the life of a child every three minutes, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).
The executive director, Accident Prevention And Rescue Initiative, Prince Fidelis Nnadi, gave the WHO statistics yesterday at the launching of the Abuja Child Safety Campaign.
“The World Health Organisation (WHO) statistics confirm that a child is killed in an accident every three minutes in Nigeria, and that about 42 per cent of the children are killed by reckless speeding, drunken motorists and distractions like the use of cell-phones.”
The director, Arrive Alive Road Initiative, Mr. Yinka Bello, at the launching of the child safety campaign, observed that the majority of schools in Abuja use “school buses that are not internationally recommended to convey students to school.
“A survey recently conducted by the Federal Road Safety Commission in Abuja, revealed that most schools use mini- buses which fall below recommended standards,” Bello said.
He also said that a survey by the FRSC revealed that most government schools had no buses.
“According to the FRSC’s report, 86 per cent of the private schools studied have school buses, and it was observed that only 33 per cent of government schools have school buses,” he stated.