The leaflet acts as a reminder that although road crashes have reduced in Europe since 2001, there is still a lot to do and lots of lives to save. The leaflet offers an illustrative understanding of how countries are doing with regards to road crash and road fatality reduction across Europe.

Road crashes still the biggest killer of young people.

Last year, Brian’s first column received a warm welcome and he continues to shower YOURS with articles focusing on youth and road safety issues in Africa. In this article, Brian talks about the road fatalities taking place over the Christmas and holiday period and asks the question, ‘Why are some road safety advocates inconsistent with their safety language?’. Brian gives us the low-down.

Much #respects to every one in the new year of 2012. Much more #respects to those road safety gurus whose mission was to make road safety a priority during the festive season:-and needless to mention, the new year celebrations! Great and innovative road safety promotion by youths in Angola where they staged a serious road safety education campaign in the northern Capital culminating into only 1 case of morbidity between 25th December 2011 and 1st January 2012. Bear in mind, this is arguably the busiest part of this country. The Gambian Youth Parliament did not sleep either, possibly because of the trade mark phrase ‘Accidents Never Announce Their Party’. Nor was the YOURS Team in Africa asleep:-Congrats/Felicitations/Asante Sana To YOURS Regional Director, Miss Sheila for running the show of the Embrace Life Campaign! Please #Marry Me (sic).

In Ghana, pressure from the youths reached a threshold thanks to their suggested peaceful demonstrations against road accidents during the festive season! Yes, it fueled the Motor Traffic and Transport Unit of the Ghana Police Service, Inspector Simon Tenku to appeal to political leaders to include road safety messages in their political campaign in the upcoming 2012 general elections. Now, that’s a confirmatory test of what solidarity and healthy public policy as regards road safety is concerned. In Uganda, a Gaagaa Bus Company that has consistently and successfully failed to keep their buses in good condition, obeying resting points, over speeding and speeding has had its license suspended as six died in a messy crash on 9th January 2012.

Like we say in Africa, ‘Satan Was Also God’s Servant’ and so were crashes during the festive season. Notably, that 25 people were confirmed dead in a single ghastly motor accident that took place at a bend near Obangede junction, (Nigeria) It didn’t go un noticed in Ghana as a total of 270 people lost their lives through motor accidents in the Eastern Region in 2011 as against 245 in 2010, showing an increase of 25 deaths. And look at this:-According to the Road Traffic Management Corporation (RMTC) in South Africa, approximately 800 people died since the beginning of December on South Africa’s roads over the festive season in December. For soccer fans like my self, we were gutted to loose 10 of our colleagues on December 28th 2011 as a Road accident claimed lives of Somali football fans!

But, why oh why are these crashes happening?

Only a person from Planet mars may not be aware of why these ‘Road Traffic Accidents’ happen. Among the many, something is a miss as regards, the language that we use in Africa. For those that didn’t know, Africa, among the documented, has over 20,000 different languages :-that is no surprise considering that there are 62 different languages in my country Uganda. Relating this to the health education and health promotion model, there is a cool chance of misinterpretation of a number of road safety messages. Special reference is made to these 2 words:‘SPEEDING’ & ‘OVER SPEEDING’.

You must have been puzzled by community members, reporters, sometimes Road Traffic Officers, Policy makers and road safety advisers yelling on top of their lungs (read advocating for road safety) while using these 2 important words simultaneously. I personally have prepared and served the same soup of ‘Speeding and Over speeding’, but all that changed to having met one English Doctor and Vice Chancellor of International health Sciences University, Dr. Nick Wooding, who for 2 hours successfully failed to convince us on the difference during our many public health debates! On the 4th meeting, we were hit by a fact that, there is no ‘African’ language that puts a significant difference between these two important words as regards road safety. From the west coast of Malabo in Equatorial Guinea to the far East of Mombasa Port in Kenya, from the Cape of Good Hope in South Africa through the pearl of Africa (that’s my country, Uganda by the way) to extreme north, Cairo, Egypt, it remains a mystery over why the languages spoken over this stretch have endured a successful failure to define these words differently.

In the English version, Over speed is a condition in which an engine is allowed or forced to turn beyond its design limit. The consequences of running an engine too fast vary by engine type and model and depend upon several factors, chief amongst them the duration of the over speed and by the speed attained. With some engines even a momentary over speed can result in greatly reduced engine life or even catastrophic failure. The speed of an engine is ordinarily measured in revolutions per minute (RPM). Speeding on the other hand, according to the American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition is the act or an instance of driving especially a motor vehicle faster than is allowed by law. Well, I suppose, that is pretty beautiful as regards the difference. It looks evident that speeding comes before the so called over speeding! Literally meaning, if our programmes technically looked at obeying speed limits, we definitely would be more effective…wouldn’t we? huh? I bet, we would.

Bottom line; road safety messages need to be consistent and send the same message across a region that boasts of diversified culture, beliefs and a number of gods watching over their territories.

This could be best achieved through effective pre-testing, consistent process and impact evaluation of campaigns and needless to mention, effective behavioral health promotion on road safety that should focus on the language bearing in mind that both the young and the old have a different language already. Hello Road Safety Organisations.

Its been almost half a decade since the United Nations World Youth Assembly for Road Safety took place at the United Nations building, Palais des Nations in Geneva, Switzerland! As many of you know, the World Youth Assembly (WYA) was the foundation stone in the building of YOURS – Youth for Road Safety; a tangible road safety NGO that harnessed the energy of the assembly into a real movement for young people and road safety. YOURS celebrates the assembly’s five year anniversary in the months to come!

Young people froma round the world came together to discuss road safety.

On 23-24 April 2007, the United Nations opened their doors and welcomed nearly 400 young people from over 100 nations to sit on the benches graced by world leaders to discuss global road safety in our changing world. The United Nations World Youth Assembly for Road Safety, a one of its kind event, was organized by The World Health Organization (WHO) and United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) along with an international working group (referred to as Chairs of the Assembly). It brought together socially active young people via the support of national Ministries of Transport and International Organizations.

Many young people attended the assembly with little to no knowledge about the global road safety problem and were shocked and moved to bear witness to the facts and figures about the number of young people being killed on the worlds’ roads. After two days of intense debates, training and understanding the global road safety problem facing young people around the world, the young people left the assembly feeling energized and geared for action in their nations.

1,049 balloons release signifies that the 1,049 young lives lost on the world’s roads are not in vain.

The energy generated at the forum created a strong momentum for the youth and road safety movement around the world. The young people not only learned that they and their peers face a higher risk on the road because of their behaviour but also that these crashes and deaths were preventable. The delegates at the assembly heard presentations from world leaders, health professionals and also victims of road crashes. A poignant moment at the assembly was the releasing of 1,049 balloons to mark the amount of young people aged 11-25 killed on the world’s roads every day.

One of the most significant milestones for youth and road safety came in the form of the World Youth Declaration for Road Safety, a delcaration adopted by the youth of the world to call for the involvement of young people in road safety nationally, regionally and internationally; to put youth and road safety issues on the agenda and to reduce the amount of young people being killed on the road. They left the assembly as official United Nations World Youth Ambassadors for Road Safety to make change in their nations and save millions of young lives around the world.

The establishment of YOURS was a culmination of the efforts and energy demonstrated at and after the World Youth Assmebly leading to the international non-governmental organization that we know today.

As a special feature, YOURS will be using the following months up until the 23 April 2012 to showcase what the United Nations World Youth Ambassadors are doing now;

YOURS will run special features on the United Nations World Youth Ambassadors for Road Safety until April’s anniversary day.

Many of the youth ambassadors from the Assembly are now directors of their own road safety organizations, run road safety projects or still work with young people because of their involvement with the WYA. Many of the member of our active International Youth Network for Road Safety were delegates to the WYA. In the coming months, YOURS will be contacting the ambassadors for dedicated interviews on what they are doing now for road safety!

Stay tuned for special the special features!