23 June 1999
The Minister of Transport Dullah Omar today announced that the death toll on South Africa’s roads went down in 1998 saving 623 lives and the country approximately R475,3 million in casualty accidents.
Releasing the findings of the Statistics South Africa’s audited report for the Department of Transport on road collisions reported in 1998, Omar said that road deaths reduced from 9,691 in 1997 to 9,068 in 1998 (a reduction of 6,43%). Serious injuries went down 7,78% from 39,302 in 1997 to 36,246 in 1998 (a reduction of 7,78%) and slight injuries went from 91,760 to 84,358 (down 8,07%) for the same period.
The number of fatal crashes were also reduced from 7790 in 1997 to 7260 in 1998, while major crashes went down from 23,059 to 21,265 and minor crashes went down 9,22% from 57,391 to 53,097.
The overall 7,9% reduction in these types of accidents saved the economy R475,3 million according to CSIR estimates of the cost of a fatal, major or minor crash.
The overall number of crashes increased by 1,1% due to a 3,17% increase in damage-only crashes from 417,748 in 1997 to 430,983 in 1998. Damage-only crashes make up 84% of accidents on South Africa’s roads.
The Minister thanked the outgoing Minister of Transport Mac Maharaj and all roleplayers, particularly the MECs for Transport and the provincial and local traffic officers for their role in the campaign. He also acknowledged the invaluable contribution of the Board of the Road Accident Fund to ARRIVE ALIVE and hoped that they will continue with their investment to decrease third party claims.
Omar said that reduction in road deaths for the second successive year was an encouraging sign that the ARRIVE ALIVE road safety campaign was making an impact on South African road users. He said that ARRIVE ALIVE has since its inception in 1997 exceeded its target of a 5% reduction in fatalities during its three campaigns. Since 1996 there had been a 7,52% reduction in fatal crashes and a 1,76% decrease in all types of crashes (including damage-only crashes).
But the number of deaths on South African road is still unacceptably high and Omar urged all roleplayers to support the fourth ARRIVE ALIVE campaign in 1999.
Of the 9068 deaths in 1998: 2741 were drivers, 2875 were passengers and 3452 were pedestrians. Compared with 1997 this showed reductions of -3,8%; -7,9%; and -7,3% respectively.
What was disturbing, Omar said, was that the highest number of deaths were in the 20 - 29 age group(33,7%) followed by the 30 - 39 age group (28,1%), which meant that more than 55% of the deaths on our roads were breadwinners which has serious implications for both the economy and family life in our country.
As in previous years the majority of crashes involved cars (62,5%), followed by light-delivery vehicles (16,3%), minibuses (8,0%), heavy vehicles (5,4%), buses (1,2%) and others (5,2%). There was a 1,8% increase in crashes involving light- delivery vehicles and a 0,8% decrease in heavy vehicles. Crashes involving minibuses (of which about 65% are taxis) were slightly down in 1998 from 8,2% to 8,0%.
Gauteng (the province with the highest vehicle population) had the highest number of fatal crashes (1728 : 23%) followed by KwaZulu-Natal (1169), Western Cape (1064), Mpumalanga (798), Eastern Cape (704), Free State (615), North West (537), Northern Province (409) and Northern Cape (236). The fatality rates in three provinces increased: Eastern Cape, Free State and Mpumalanga. All six other provinces reported decreases.
The increases in these provinces might also be due to improved reporting methods introduced by ARRIVE ALIVE as crashes from some of the former homelands have only starting to be reported more regularly by police to Statistics SA over the past year.
The majority of the 511,605 crashes in 1998 took place in urban areas (460,827) and 50,778 were in rural areas.
The magisterial districts in the country with the highest number of crashes, together with their percentage contribution to casualty accidents, are as follows:
Johannesburg (9,5%); Pretoria (6,2%); Durban (3,5%); Port Elizabeth (2,2%); Mitchell’s Plain (1,9%); Wynberg, WC (1,8%) Roodepoort (1,7%); Bloemfontein (1,7%); Cape Town (1,6%) and Germiston (1,6%).
Fifty percent (50%) of the country’s casualties are contributed to by only 27 magisterial districts, which includes the above 10.
The 1998 report also confirmed previous trends that the majority of daily crashes take place between 4pm and 10pm (33,2%) and the highest number of weekly crashes are reported on Fridays and Saturdays (32,8%).
Issued by Didi Moyle: PA and Media Liaison Officer to the Minister of Transport
Didi Moyle
PA and Media Liaison Officer to the Minister of Transport
Pretoria: (012) 309 3131 (phone) or (012) 328 3194 (fax)
Cape Town: (021) 457260 (phone) or (021) 461 6845 (fax)
email: moyle@mweb.co.za
or moyled@ndot.pwv.gov.za
(Pretoria only)
cell: 082 808 5108