- Safiu Kehinde
The President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Monica Dongban-Mensem, has on Thursday, appealed to Nigerians to always show more concern and assist accident victims in rescuing them from the cold hands of death.
Dongban -Mensem, who is also a Special Road Marshal, made the appeal during the 13th annual conference of Kwapda’as Road Safety Demand (KRSD) Foundation.
She held that the campaign for Road Safety has been on for 13 years in memory of her son who was killed by a hit and run driver.
She added that her son was left to die bleeding.
” Today, makes it 13 years since we started our campaigns for road safety in Nigeria.
” We want people to remember that if today there is a road victim and they are not the ones, they could be the ones next, it could be their relations, it could be the people that they are concerned about.
” So we expect that people should remember that fact, that nobody is beyond being knocked down since our roads are still very insecure” she said.
She also called for support of road safety initiatives and campaigns.
“We should also support initiatives like this, you know, to ensure sanity on our roads.
“And supporting, you can take action by being part of the campaign to inform people because, there is a lot of ignorance, there is a lot of apathy, people seem to be disinterested when it comes to road safety issues”. Dongban-Mensem added.
Nigerian roads, she said, are overused because, that was the only means of transportation now in Nigeria .
” When you give information, when you dare to come out and go to the court and give evidence against people that you know have misused and undermined our laws; then you are participating in the administration of justice, in ensuring that our roads are safe,
“We can take personal commitment, by committing to ensuring that we do not add to the road mishaps on the road, on our highways, by being properly trained, take time, don’t look for shortcuts to getting, driver’s licence, ensure that you’re properly trained.” She continued.
Dongban-Mensem also said called for the establishment of a trauma center where victims in need we can helped.
”We are actively involved in the fifth standard of road safety, the five pillars.
”We are particularly engaged in the victim part, which is meant to bring support to victims of road crashes” she said.