As the world marked the Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims on Sunday, 86 people met their fate in Egypt in less than 9 hours just one day before in different traffic accidents. It was as if the most populous country of 90 million people marked its own 'Day of Crashes'. Ironically, the fatality toll in New York City was 43 due to Hurricane Sandy, which caused an estimated $50 billion in property damage on the US East Coast earlier this month. Following a tragic collision between a bus and train at a level crossing in the Upper Egyptian governorate of Assiut, 300km south of Cairo, the transport minister and the head of the country's railway authority were sacked. The deadly crash highlights the death toll on Egyptian roads; roughly 7,000 people get killed and 32,000 injured annually, according to a study by the Cabinet's Information and Decision Support Centre (IDSC). Road accidents have reached 30,000 per annum on average, according to IDSC. More than 360 people meet their fate per 1,000km in traffic crashes in Egypt, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO). The international death toll rate in traffic crashes stands at 20 deaths per 1,000km. The number of road accidents in Egypt from January 1990 until October 2008 totalled 426,400, killing and injuring 100,900 and 440,000 people respectively, according to IDSC. Commenting on such appalling statistics, late satirist Galal Amer described the transport ministry as "an undertaker that transports man from life to the hereafter". Globally, road traffic accidents kill nearly 1.3 million people every year and injure or disable as many as 50 million more. They are the leading cause of death among young people aged 15 to 29, according to the WHO. "Nearly 3,500 people die on the world's roads every day. Tens of millions are injured or disabled every year," the United Nations said on its website on Sunday. "Human error and the deteriorated infrastructure of the railways are the cause of railway accidents in Egypt," said Khaled Abbas, the head of the National Transportation Institute. Commenting on the Assiut tragedy, where 67 schoolchildren were killed when a bus collided with a train, Abbas said: "Around 15 per cent of vehicles and 25 per cent of pedestrians get killed on level crossings. Some vehicles cross only seconds ahead of trains." The cost of road accidents in Egypt accounts for 1 to 1.5 per cent of the gross domestic product (GDP), according to a report by the Shura Council (Upper House of Parliament). Thirty people get killed in traffic accidents each day, the report said. In 2011, road accidents totalled 100,000, costing the economy LE16 billion ($2.6 billion). Human errors caused 68 per cent of these crashes, according to IDSC. Mohamed Soleiman, a road expert, calls for shutting down all level crossings to put an end to these fatal accidents. "They [level crossings] should be replaced by tunnels or bridges. This is the ultimate solution," Soleiman said, adding that road problems date back to the 1950s. Although the Transport Ministry has spent LE5.6 million on what it called a plan to develop 1,725 level crossings nationwide, barriers remain dilapidated and traffic lights seem to be out of service! "There must be a plan for the future. The population of Cairo is expected to hit 20 million by 2020. With the increase of cars and other vehicles, the situation will be disastrous," he said. The population of Cairo (without Giza) stands at 8.9 million, according to the state-run Central Agency for Public Mobilisation and Statistics (CAPMAS). There were 5.85 million cars at the end of 2010, or seven per 100 people, according to CAPMAS. There are around 300,000 tok-toks and 1.5 million motorcycles nationwide, according to unofficial estimates. The road expert suggests that the government should build up to five ring roads to meet the growing population and increase of cars to ease traffic jams in the next decade. But the government is following in the footsteps of the toppled regime, one activist said, referring to the sacking of the transport minister and railway chief. "The government does not move unless a catastrophe occurs. It does not know anything about preventive measures," said Nader Abdel Rahman of the Revolutionary Youth Coalition. "It's really painful to read that Al-Ahly Club will reward each player of its football team with LE120,000 for winning the African Champions League, while each family of the killed schoolchildren will only get LE5,000," Abdel Rahman added, referring to the Cairo-based club's victory over Tunisia's Esperance on Saturday night. "I was shocked to see people rejoicing and dancing while the whole of Upper Egypt was mourning. Is there any blood running in our veins anymore?" he wondered.
