The Kuala Lumpur Traveler

While the family of the deceased are mourning their deaths and the survivors are suffering in the hospital, finger pointing for the worst road accident involving a bus in the nation’s history continues. Latest move by the authority is to make the CEOs of the bus companies responsible.

Road Safety Department director-general Datuk Suret Singh, who was also present, said, “The time has come for CEOs to be taken to court. Safety should the first and last priority,” he said

Source [Star Online]

Before this latest move announced by the authority, the cause of the accident was squarely blamed on the driver, who had apparently accumulated a lot of traffic offences.

Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi blamed human error and carelessness, and told authorities to carry out an investigation for possible prosecution of those culpable.

Source [Malaysiakini]

The 37-year-old bus driver, who was killed with 19 of his passengers in one of the country’s worst road accidents, habitually broke road rules over more than six years and chalked up 13 summonses - none of which have been settled - totalling RM1,980.

Rohizan had been caught speeding six times, for not wearing a seat belt, not producing a driving licence and driving a bus which did not have a permit.

He had accumulated enough demerit points to have his licence revoked but no authority ever caught on.

Source [Star Online]

However there is something seriously missing in this finger pointing affair. The fingers seem to pointing to all directions but the authority itself.

While those reasons as the cause of the accidents given by the authority were factual, and the moves announced by same authority were expected, why there is no one from the authority accepting the responsibility for the failure on their part to enforce the laws on their part? Is it so hard to track serious traffic offenders such as the bus driver in question in the IT era? You know the answer to that.

Recently, Malaysians watched in disbelief how the roof of several new government buildings collapsed and guess what…. it was the contractors who had to shoulder all the blame. What happened to the authority who had aproved the shoddy works in the first place? Who took responsibility for that?

OK, the public is probably asking too much if they are expecting someone from the authorities that are ‘dumb’ enough to admit their failures to enforce the laws, but ‘blame others’ attitude in all the government authorities is something of very serious concern.

And back to the idea of making CEOs of the bus company responsible for the drivers carelessness or whatever reasons causing the accidents, I am not sure how much thought have been put into this by the authority. My two cents is that this is not the solution to the problem. The real solutions are enforcements of the existing laws by the various governments agencies. Period.

If the authority still insists that this is the solution, then why the CEOs of the bus companies only? Lets make the CEOs of other public transports accountable as well. Lets make CEO for KTM responsible for train mishaps, CEOs for taxis companies accountable for accidents involving their taxis, the CEOs for the LRTs shouldering the blame for the various LRT accidents that had happened and will happen in the future, MAS CEO for their planes crash, Tony Fernandez for AirAsia skidding off the runaway…. the list goes on. And I am sure the more you add, the more it shows that this latest measure is simply absurd to say the least. And while we are at it, lets make CEOs of the government agencies accountable as well for failures to enforce their own laws. What do you think?

I wish the authorities really look into the root causes in resolving problems that are affecting the public in the future. Only then, accidents such the one happened in Bukit Gantang and the collapsed roof of the government building can be avoided, if not reduced.

[tags]bus accident, bus crash, Road Safety Department, Syarikat Kenderaan Bukit Gantang, Rohizan Abu Bakar[/tags]