1.0 Introduction
It is now a tradition that no day passes without one reading one kind of road traffic accident or the other in both the print media and the electronic media.
It is highly improbable that any family exist today within our Nigeria nation, which has not experienced the anguish of the sudden loss of a beloved one as a result of accidents that could have been avoided, on our road. And if we broaden our search to embrace the traditional framer work of the extended family, we can go even further and declare that no day passes each family undergoing the agony of the premature loss of one of its members.
This violent interruption of an ordered, secure existence has become a common place in the life of average Nigerian, creating a permanent state of anxiety whenever a friend, relation or colleague is waved off at the commencement of even the briefest journey on our roads. The routine greeting of “safe journey” is silently or loudly augmented by fervent prayers for a successful conclusion of this plunge into the unknown. Infact, the situation has reached an epidemic state.
This particularly unfortunate phenomenon, when viewed against the background that most of the people involved are the productive part of the population and the rampant occurrence of the accident are caused by circumstances which are believed to be avoidable, is pathetic.
Most problems of society are man-made. The motor vehicle is an invention of the human mind, any problems that accompany it's utilization must therefore be subjected to controls set also by the human mind.
Meanwhile, it is well known that the primary victims of road traffic accidents-road users and government alike-do not always pay the deserving attention to preventive measures needed to drastically reduce the traffic an economic waste associated with road traffic accidents. All the countries of the world road traffic accident have been source of instant grief, agonies to families as well as big drains to human lives and properties. This trend has reached a chronic level in Africa and Nigeria in particular. The state of accident in road transport operation is centered on how to reduce accidents in road transport operation in Nigeria.
One of the greatest attributes of federal road safety commission and other road safety agent like the traffic department of the Nigeria police force etc have perpetual involvement in the process of controlling road user's behavior by preventive, persuasive and the safety and efficient movement of traffic.
Every man, woman and child in this nation has a right to life, and to a life in which all his or her faculties are intact: not as an oral or visual handicap; not as a patch work freak, the result of multiple skin grafts after third-degree burns in a high way inferno; not worst of all, as a mere vegetable in a wheel chair, hearing without the ability to respond, impervious to sensations, which everybody accept as the norm of meaningful existence, become, in it's own harrowing dimensions, part of the ever widening pool of wasted human resources or, to use an expression with which we must be familiar, yet another traffic view of “the wasted Generation”
1.2 Aim and Objectives of the Study
The main purpose of this project report it to Review Road Accident in Nigeria, using Akwa Ibom State as a case study. THIS is accessed by looking at Accident causes, accident preventive measures, Accident records and statistic and also the different types of accidents.
In the last sixteen years, vehicle population and distance covered in Nigeria increased by almost 1,000 percent while the number of deaths per thousand road traffic accidents rose from 168 in 1972 to 352 in 1988 and safe road use and motoring habits have continued to deteriorate.(The Revise Highway Code).
Everyday, hundreds of our fellow human beings are injured, paralyzed, disfigured for life, and many are killed outrightly or die a slow, painful death. Just in four years, from 1985 to 1988, 105,342 accident with 89,006 injured and 33,096 dead were officially reported to the police. There were many more that were not reported. This inhuman accident record has far-reading effects on family life, on development and economic life of the country.
The strained health services often cannot adequately look after accident victims. Entire families, relations, friend and colleagues are suddenly swept away, bringing grief and economic hardship to the survivors. The country suffers by losing it's talented and productive Manpower often in the prime of life. Using the road therefore is not fun and games. It is serious, often deadly business. Death comes easy to anybody through a little fault. We should therefore exercise care and patience on the roads, think about safety and avoid aggression or arrogance.
1.3 Relevance of the Study
Most of the roads in the country draw anxiety in most motorists and commuters. A day hardly passes on these roads without a report of blood spillage, often occasioned by fatal accidents. The dilemma of passing through these roads is such that if you are lucky to travel without a scratch in a trip, you may nurse a perpetual fright over confronting or intimidating gory pictures of accident victims.
1.4 Statement of Problems
In Nigeria and infact all over the world, road transport is the principle mode of transporting goods and people. This importance is manifested in inventory of Highway facilities and in the investment in the highway transport industry. Just as the road transport system is responsible for developing an economy through it's flexibility and efficiency in the movement of traffic, it's negative effects in transport industry (Oron 1988),such negative effects include noise, environmental pollution, congestion and accident.
Accident have constituted the most disturbing of these undesirable social cost of the highway system. Nigeria has an embarrassing record being one of the worst road accident nations in the world. From report of the federal road safety commission, it is clear that since 1960, road traffic accidents have been claiming 30,000 casualities and 12,000 families every year. This is an epidemic which scarifies the lives of over 190 persons per 10,000 or an average of 60 causalities mained or killed per day.
Even in warfare, such losses are unacceptable and in peace time, must be viewed with the utmost alarm, especially since the causes can be prevented or reduced.
1.5 Scope and Limitations of the Study
The study is confined with the review of road traffic accidents in Nigeria. The research was limited due to lack of time and money to travel wide to source for materials. It was not easy for me to lay my hands on relevant materials due to the fact there are not enough materials on accidents.
1.6 Organization of Work
This project report is made up of five chapters. Chapter one is the introduction. Chapter two is the literature review/ the Historical background of the study. Chapter four is the General study of “The review of road traffic accident in Nigeria” (A case study on Akwa Ibom state). Chapter five is the summary/conclusion and Recommendation. Then references and questionnaire.
