MEC WESSELS MORWENG MEDIA BRIEFING RELEASING THE 2024/2025 FESTIVE SEASON ROAD CRASH STATISTICS
MONDAY 27 JANUARY 2025
MEC BOARDROOM, TIRELO BUILDING – MMABATHO
The Head of the Department, Dr Hans Kekana
Chief Director for Transport Regulations, Mr Molefi Morule
Other senior Managers of the Department here present
Members of the Media
Good morning
We activated the Provincial Road Safety Campaign in Zeerust on the 13th of December 2024 as part of the Government Accelerated Service Delivery Programme, Thuntsha Lerole. As had been emphasised a week earlier by Transport Minister, Ms Barbara Creecy when launching the national programme, the campaign was based on four pillars:
❖ Responsible Driving
❖ Pedestrian Safety
❖ Enforcement and Education
❖ Collaboration
We included the focus on pedestrians as previous year’s statistics had indicated a growing number of pedestrians who become victims of crashes and often at late hours of the day. Compared to the year before, for the 2023/2024 travels, we recorded 98 fatalities from 86 crashes. For this year, the 2024/2025 festive period, we have a slight increase of 100 fatalities from 98 crashes.
Despite this slight increase, the Province remain second best performing in terms of least recorded fatalities. It is also worth mentioning that we did not record any major crash, meaning where four or more lives are lost in a single accident.
The critical route remained the N4 from our boundary with Gauteng in Brits to Dinokana at the border with Botswana. We have lost eight lives on this road followed closely by N12 where five lives were lost on crashes that occurred between Potchefstroom and Bloemhof. The other critical road is R24 that links Rustenburg and Krugersdorp in Gauteng which recorded four fatalities followed by N14 which also recorded four fatalities.
In terms of the Districts, Bojanala has recorded in total, forty fatalities from thirty-five crashes. Ngaka Modiri Molema has recorded twenty-seven fatalities from twenty-two crashes. Dr Kenneth Kaunda District has recorded twenty-three fatalities from twenty crashes. Lastly Dr Ruth Segomotsi Mompati has recorded ten fatalities from ten crashes.
Of the hundred fatalities, thirty-eight were passengers, twenty-nine were drivers, another twenty-nine were pedestrians, three fell off the moving vehicles and one was a cyclist.
Time also played a role in the number of crashes hence we always advise road users to avoid travelling at night. Of the hundred fatalities, sixty-one of those happened between 18:00 to 06:00 the following morning. In between, meaning during the day from 06:00 to 18:00, we lost thirty-nine lives.
Our approach this time was different. Instead of having traditional law enforcement operations which are commonly known as roadblocks, we had patrols where our officers were monitoring moving violations. This we believe reduced accidents and instead increasing general compliance with the road traffic regulations.
This as drivers tend to obey the law in the presence of traffic officers and increase speed once they have passed enforcement operations. We had also been operating for twenty hours especially on N4.
The following challenges were encountered during the deployment and contributed to cancellation of some of our plans to ensure visibility on the roads. Rain and flooding of some of the arterial roads especially N14 outside Delareyville. Protests by communities also impacted negatively on our plans as often we had to divert officers to deal with them rather focusing on national roads.
In conclusion, I want to express my profound gratitude to all law enforcement officers for their hard work in reducing numbers of crashes. When we enjoyed our festivities during the holidays, they were out there enduring all forms of weather patterns by being visible on the roads.
Thank you very much.
ENDS!!!
