Road Safety Week: SCI sensitises school children on traffic rules

As Nigeria join the rest of the world to commemorate the 2023 Global Road Safety Week, Save the Children International (SCI) on Friday, sensitized school children on traffic rules and how to keep safe on the roads.

The sensitization programme which held at the Junior Secondary School (JSS) Gwarimpa, Abuja, is the third in the series of programme designed in this campaign.

Head, Safety and Security Department SCI Nigeria, Peter Adomi, said the programme was to equip children with the right knowledge on road signs and reduce their involvement in road accidents.

He said, “You will recall that this week is United Nations Week for Road Safety and Save the Children as an International Organisation that is working in almost every country in the world, we are part of that campaign to keep our roads safe and we as the largest children advocacy organisation in the world, we focus on children to help them to be safe on the road and around areas where traffic affects them.

“We felt that the best place to be is school and that is why we are here to sensitise the children to observe road safety rules and regulations.

Adomi also expressed concern that most private schools are not putting in effort to educate their students on traffic rules.

“We are focusing on Government Secondary Schools for now. In the course of planning for this programme, we realise that the private school have their setting and they are not too open to this kind of campaign.

“I will want to put on record that statistics and data of road transport accidents around schools are more around private schools. That is an area of concern to us because that is where you have the largest traffic of school pick up and drop off and that is where you will find people really being in a hurry to dash off and pick their children or drop them as the case may be. A lot of children gets hurt in that process.

“The theme for this year for us in Save the Children is “Zebra Crossing” because we know that if children know how to use the Zebra Crossing properly, it’s going to be a very big one for them because alot of children also get knock down on the Zebra Crossing”, he stressed.

Mr Adomi however assured that the international organisation will also extend the sensitization to drivers, to educate them on road signs and the rules & regulations guiding the roads.

“We are not stopping at talking to the children, we are going to hit the road also and probably do a little sensitisation around drivers, commuters, road users knowing exactly what the zebra crossing is supposed to be. That it is not a road decoration but a road traffic rule that must be obeyed for the safety of those who are meant to use it”, he added.

Advocacy Campaigns and Policy Manager, Save the Children International, Edith Nankiling Gumut, said the organisation in collaboration with other relevant agencies will ensure the establishment of road safety clubs in schools that are yet to have one for continuous sensitization on road rules.

According to her, “We realise that some of the schools already have existing road safety clubs while some other schools do not have clubs. So for Save the Children, we will continue working with road safety clubs in some of the schools that we have that existing and for the schools that do not have road safety clubs, we are going to coordinate with the Gederal Road Safety Corp and the school management to see how we can establish a road safety club and then we use those platforms to engage with the children and consistently create awareness and see how they get to become very good at obeying road safety rules”.

One of the students of JSS Gwarimpa, Naanee letoo mene, appreciated SCI for educating students in the school on traffic rules.

“Road safety are the rules and regulations that road users have to obey and we were thought on how to contact the VIO, Police officers or Road Safety Corps if we see young children like us on the road. They should try to keep us safe from harm and accidents and road users should try and obey all the rules and regulations on the road”, she said.

The Global Road Safety Week was declared by the United Nations, to raise awareness on the need for safety on the roads and make changes that would reduce the number of road accidents.