Road safety groups are advocating that young inexperienced drivers be banned from driving “big weapon” vehicles and are calling on Parliament to revise the Motor Vehicles and Traffic Regulations.
“Why are we going backwards?” Denise Dias of the Mothers in Black association said in response to the amendment to the Motor Vehicles and Traffic Regulations.
Prior to the 2013 amendment to the regulation, drivers 18 years and older were licenced to drive a motor lorry and only drivers 25 years and older were permitted to operate a minibus. However, in April this regulation was altered by the Home Affairs Minister, according to the powers
conferred upon him by Section 104 of the Motor Vehicle and Traffic Act.
Chapter 51:02 of the amended regulation stated that a person who desires to obtain a licence for a hire car, motor bus or goods vehicle must be “at least 21 years of age… the holder of a licence issued under Section 29 for the minimum period of two years or in respect to a re-migrant, a licence issued under Section 29 together with a valid driving licence and a licence for the class of vehicle that the competent authority of a country other than Guyana…and submit a statement signed by a licencing officer to the effect that the applicant has been successful in the examination as to the provision of the Act relating to traffic.”
Dias said she was “absolutely shocked and stunned” that the age limit was reduced from 25 to 21 years old and was repulsed that the bodies involved in formulating the law allowed the amendment. “… The legislation is allowing these young people to drive,” she stated, noting that it is the root of Guyana’s high motor vehicle accident rate.
“The crash rate is high anyway for such a small country so to allow more unqualified people on the road is crazy,” she posited, adding that teenagers and young adults are not fully matured to drive a lorry or a public vehicle.
Mothers in Black and the Guyana National Road Safety Council have been petitioning for years to have the regulation modified to 25 years and older for lorries and minibuses. “… Allowing teenagers to drive a truck is nonsense,” Dias argued.
She insisted that it was nonsensical that passengers would travel in a minibus with an under-aged driver or allow a teenager to drive a lorry. “The laws are in place but somehow teenagers are licenced to drive a truck. How come they are behind the wheels? They are still developing their brains and they lack the experience,” she stated.
In August, a teenager Judah Louisy of Lot 121 Half Mile, Wismar, Linden was charged with dangerous driving which resulted in the death of 12-year-old Johnny Romeo Da Silva.
Da Silva was playing with his ball when it bounced on the Soesdyke/Linden Highway. He climbed onto the rail of a nearby bridge and threw the ball to his friends and was from that rail hit and thrown into the air.
A similar accident occurred later that month with an 18-year-old boy who was racing along the East Bank Public road, with his two siblings in the backseat of a pick-up truck, when the vehicle ran into a trench.
And recently, four persons were killed and six others injured when a Mahdia-bound bus they were travelling in collided head on with a truck at Coverden, East Bank Demerara, in the vicinity of Kaylee’s Gas Station in October. The driver, Retish Bhagwandin, was 20-years-old. He was charged with four counts of causing death by dangerous driving.
“What experience does these drivers have? None!” Dias charged. She said law enforcers should be blamed for permitting such young persons to drive. She added that parents too should be held liable. “I imagine a parent allowing their teenage child to drive and it’s unthinkable. I feel for the families who lost their loved ones. It saddens and sickens me that the laws are not being enforced,” she stated.
Dias further expressed her disappointment with law enforcers, arguing that some licencing officers would grant persons licences through bribery. “People are paying for their licences. To allow more unqualified people on the road is just crazy,” she reiterated.
Meanwhile, a police source said that civilians are liable to their own opinions but the traffic department is trying its best to ensure that traffic laws are enforced. “We are only the enforcers of the law. What was passed in Parliament is the law and we can’t change that but we can have our own recommendations,” the source said, noting that there was a force policy prior to the Motor Vehicle and Traffic Regulations amendment. The policy, he said, allowed space for experience and persons who desired to drive a lorry must have had some years of experience.
“However, what transpired before shouldn’t be applicable now,” the source added.
We see it as a problem to give a 19-year-old a truck licence or a 21-year-old a minibus licence, Ramona Doorgen of the Guyana National Road Safety Council told Sunday Stabroek. She noted that the association has been pushing for the age limit for minibus and lorry licences to be raised to 25.
“They would have more years of experience… and they would be more mature in their thinking,” she said, arguing that parents and law enforcers should not allow persons under this age to drive “big weapon” vehicles, especially heavy-duty trucks.
“As parents we need to be more responsible. Yes, people are killed and the parents then have to now see them suffer the consequences of that crime. It’s irresponsible,” she charged. “Road safety is everyone’s business…it’s not just the police but also the civilians,” she stated, asking people to reports cases of underage drivers, unlicenced drivers and drivers under the influence of alcohol.
She called for motor lorry and minibus licence’s regulations to be reviewed and truck drivers to be well trained and educated in road safety. “We will continue to push for 25 years until we are heard,” she said, echoing Diaz words that law enforcers need to enforce the laws.
