The dangers of using bodaboda to ferry school children

Dar es Salaam. Grim new statistics have revealed the dangers associated with ferrying children to and from school on motorcycle taxis, popularly known as “bodabodas.”
According to police, a total of 121 schoolchildren were victims of road accidents involving bodabodas in Tanzania last year.
Out of the number, 56 were killed while the other 65 sustained injuries.
The data, released yesterday during an event where the Traffic Department of the Police Force and an organisation known as Amend launched a juvenile court in Dar es Salaam yesterday, shows that the 121 children were part of the 3,268 individuals who were involved in road accidents last year.
Out of the number, 1,245 were killed while the other 2,023 sustained injuries.
The number of those who were killed includes 254 who used bodabodas.
Also a total number of 304 pedestrian were killed while 455 passengers were killed last year.
Traffic Police Commander Wilbroad Mtafungwa said most affected groups that are more vulnerable to road accidents include pedestrians, within pedestrian victims there are schoolchildren.
“Bodabodas are also contributing to the high number schoolchildren killed in road because sometimes you can find young kindergarten and schoolchildren  transported on a bodaboda  like mshikaki. Traffic and safety department, we cannot ford our arms leaving our children who are in the pedestrian group continue to lose their lives and get injured,” he said.
He said, “Bajajis are among other groups involved in road deaths. That is why we are collaborating with ‘Amend’ and other institutions in making sure that we provide awareness to the public on the importance of road safety.”

Oblivious to the dangers
Mr Mtafungwa stressed that it was unfortunate that children are being transported on motorcycles while parents, teachers and guardians seem oblivious to the dangers.
“Our children are at the risk of getting harmed in accidents. We are working with organisation to end road deaths and injuries,” he said.
‘Amend’ country director Simon Kalolo stressed that they decided to collaborate with traffic police to launch the road safety project called ‘Juvenile Court’ to provide road safety awareness to more than 11,000 primary school pupils.
“We are going to involve ten government schools. Our first priority is to vulnerable schools in all five districts within Dar es Salaam city. The training will help the students with road safety education. Students who will undergo the training will act as ambassador to educate drivers,” he said. According to him, such project were earlier implemented in 2019 and 2020 in Dar es Salaam and later in Tanga region in 2021.