17 Oct 2013

Children under the age of twenty are mostly affected by road accidents in Botswana, says Department of Road Transport (DRTS) and Safety officer, Mr Timothy Phalane.

Mr Phalane said this during the DRTS participatory educational technique (PET) project presentation in Serowe recently.

He said last year, 544 school going children were involved in road accidents, adding that these figures call for a social reform and a complete change of the mindset in regard to using roads.

Mr Phalane said these statistics are an indication of a national disaster that if not addressed early, will have severe effects.

Therefore, he called on all relevant stakeholders to collaboratively work together in an endeavor to end to this problem.

He said it is everybody’s obligation to fulfill this mandate by imparting the road safety message in a manner that will see the benefits outweighing the negatives.

Mr Phalane explained that Botswana has the second largest number of accidents which can be preventable in over 1.3 million accidents which occur in a day worldwide.

He noted that in accordance with the UN Decade of Action for Road Safety by 2020, the DRTS has also found it ideal to also actively and positively contribute to this endeavor.

Mr Phalane said it is against this backdrop that PET, a brainchild of DRTS is aimed at Junior Secondary School children and is aimed at changing learners’ attitude towards Road Safety issues by means of participatory education.

He said the involvement and participatory learning is an ideal learning form for children who are at these levels of education.

It stimulates the cognitive ability of children by engaging students in research on road traffic matters and through effectively utilizing the resources of schools since learners are encouraged to identify road safety problems in their communities or areas and find solutions to the problems.

He also explained that through this programme, learners improve their research skills and are also made aware of different role playing situations where they are made aware of different roles such as road safety officials that can assist in sorting road safety challenges in their communities.

During the presentation, Semane Junior Secondary School scooped the first prize, whereas Mmashoro and Patikwane Junior Secondary Schools got position two and three respectively. Ends