How to solve the carnage on Uganda's roads

With a population of 1.6 times that of Australia, Uganda has a road toll 8.2 times higher.  In 2013, over 10,000 people were killed on the roads here.

My research into comparative national stats has revealed that the situation in Tanzania (where we lived in 2010-11 and drove regularly) is actually worse but I think that the poorer road infrastructure and larger cities there might make up most of this difference - and we rarely drove in the cities there.  Certainly Uganda is the worst country for driving I have experienced.

This graph shows the Uganda and Tanzania road fatality rates on a per 100,000 person and per 100,000 vehicle basis compared to Australia and a range of countries many of us might have visited in our travels.  Basically if you thought India (or China or Thailand) was bad …

After driving for 3 months here in urban Kampala and on the highways leading out of town I have become somewhat used to the chaos and anarchy that tends to rule.  Rarely do we head somewhere in our car without seeing something that makes us gasp in stunned disbelief.  

We have seen coaches full of people forced off the road and trucks that have clearly had head-on collisions with other similar sized vehicles.  Fortunately we have not yet witnessed the accidents as they have happened - just the aftermath.  

The main problem is poorly trained drivers making extremely poor decisions.  If this could be fixed with a wave of a wand all would be well.  That of course is not going to happen overnight.  So what changes could be made quickly that would improve things dramatically?  

My solution is for the traffic police to target trucks.  

Nearly all trucks here - from small delivery vans to huge semi-trailers - are heavily overloaded - and many are clearly unroadworthy based on the smoke pouring out of their exhausts.  The consequence of these two factors is that the trucks crawl along the roads and highways and inevitably have a long stream of other vehicles following with impatient drivers who have poor training and make poor decisions (as previously noted).  This leads to insane overtaking and cutting in and regular accidents - either vehicles forced off the road or head-on collisions.

So my suggestion is to first target illegally overloaded and unroadworthy trucks.  “But this will add to the cost of everything we buy” I hear you say.  Maybe so in the short term but if you can haul less stuff twice as quickly and more reliably there shouldn’t be a cost impact - probably the reverse in fact.  The breakdown and accident rates and the huge costs involved with the road toll would be reduced.  A side benefit would be less pollution from the many smoking, unroadworthy trucks.

Once this is underway and the problem with trucks has become manageable I would get the police to enforce the road laws being flouted regularly by most motorists.  Priorities would be speeding, unroadworthy cars, failing to indicate when required, not using lights in foggy conditions at at night, using mobiles while driving, not using seat belts, failing to give way at intersections etc.  All these laws exist but they are not policed.  Typically we pass regular police roadblocks with numerous cops standing around.  They occasionally stop vehicles - seemingly at random.  They check for licenses and car papers only.  Overloaded and unroadworthy vehicles are routinely sent on their way.  I have seen police cars and motorbikes in traffic ignoring the most outrageous driver behavior.  

So:

1. remove the main cause of frustrations - the trucks that can’t travel at highway speeds because of overloading or unroadworthiness
2. enforce all the laws that exist that are generally ignored by most drivers
3. improve driver training
4. improve road infrastructure and signage so drivers have no excuses.

Why these things are not happening is a mystery to me!

This video is a good illustration of the driving conditions in Kampala.  Our route typically takes us through 4-5 roundabouts just like the one shown here.  It is even worse out on the open roads because of the potential speeds involved.