By Mohamed T. Massaquoi
The six-year ban on importation of right-hand drive vehicles is here to stay, the Ministry of Transport and Aviation has said, amidst a campaign by some Sierra Leoneans for a lifting of the ban.
An official said the government has no intention of even revisiting the decision taken in 2013 in response to high rates of road accidents, which were largely blamed on the proliferation of right-hand drive vehicles in a country where the standard is left-hand drive vehicles.
Those calling for a lifting of the ban say the decision left them disadvantaged. Many of them are based in the United Kingdom, where most of the right-hand drive vehicles plying the roads of Sierra Leone come from.
Andrew Momoh Fowai, who is based in Leicester, East Midlands, UK, is one of the people championing the campaign to have the government lift the ban. He told Politico that the issue of accidents should not be an excuse for the ban, noting that there is no data evidence to back such claims.
“Accidents seem to be occurring since then and all with left-hand drive vehicles,” he said in a whatsapp interview.
“UK where I live has no ban on left-hand drive vehicles even though right hand drive vehicles are predominant,” he added.
Fowai also argued that good and professional driving is what the Sierra Leone government should focus on, noting that a thoroughly trained driver could drive any vehicle anywhere.
“The driver is the issue, not the type of vehicle he/she drives,” he stressed, adding that what he would agree to is that the vehicle has to be road worthy and for them to have age limit.
As a British colony, Sierra Leone used right-hand drive vehicles, until after Independence when the country switched to left-hand driving, which is also the most common trend the world over.
But even after that it wasn’t captured in a law, until in 2011 when the Road Traffic Act passed that year outlawed right-hand drive vehicles.
When the ban was enforced in 2013, drivers and owners of all right-hand cars were given until September 1, 2014 to switch their cars over to left-hand driving.
The government back then also said that the move was part of the country’s efforts to comply with United Nations development goals and decade of action, which include improving road safety worldwide.
The Sierra Leone Road Transport Authority at the time said right-hand drive vehicles were responsible for about 70 percent of the accidents.
Deputy Minister of Transport and Aviation, Sadiq Silla, said the safety concerns associated with the use of both right-hand and left-hand vehicles at the same time remain, noting that the traffic rules in Sierra Leone are not designed for that.
“The position of our ministry remain the same. We are not going to allow the (right-hand) vehicles to even be registered to run in the country,” he told Politico.
Fowai and colleagues, who have been campaigning on social media, say the decision was merely a political one.
"United Kingdom being host to one of the largest Sierra Leonean populations in Europe would be relieved to have this political ban lifted for all the right reasons. The economic benefits for lifting such ban are enormous. Our country stands to benefit whichever way one may look at it," he said.
While dismissing the suggestion that the decision was political, Silla said the safety and security of Sierra Leoneans are more important than any other consideration.
Silla said Sierra Leoneans in the UK tend to comply with the system that exists where they live abroad but tend to want to violate the same regulations when they come home.
When the government at the time imposed the ban, it allowed all right-hand vehicles already in the country to be cleared, with the hope that they will eventually run out. Exactly six years on, there are still many of them on the roads.
But the deputy minister said these are the same vehicles already in the country. He said besides ensuring that no new right-hand vehicle enters the country, the government’s next focus regarding vehicle importation is to impose limitation on the age of used vehicles to be brought into the country. He said reports from the traffic division of the Sierra Leone Police indicate that the age of vehicles is also major factor in the high rates of accidents in the country.
"They are polluting the environment and the safety and security of those vehicles are questionable. So, as a nation and as a ministry responsible for public transportation, we are soon going to come out with a clear position about how old a vehicle should be for you to bring it into this country," he said.
© 2019 Politico Online
