A Non-Governmental Organisation, Prudential Zenith Life Insurance has collaborated with the Red Cross and the Federal Road Safety Corp (FRSC) to reduce road crashes to the minimum level in Nigeria.
Data made available by FRSC indicates that there was a 14% decrease in road crashes, a 14% reduction in injured victims, and a 15.5% decrease in fatalities in the first half of 2023 compared to the same period in 2022. Specifically, 5,700 road traffic crashes were recorded, resulting in 2,850 fatalities and 16,716 injured victims.
Speaking at the Safe Steps Road safety campaign stakeholders engagement meeting held in Abuja, the Chief Transformation and Strategy Officer of Prudential Zenith Life Insurance, Mrs. Cherice Ige said, the organization intend to achieve making the lives of Nigerians better as a life insurance company.
He added that the company see the deaths of Nigerians everyday and the core duty is to reduce it.
“This is one of the campaigns, that advocate that we can make the lives of Nigerians better because we’ll not benefit as a an insurance company but to cover less dead claims and have the lives of Nigerians community lives longer.
Mrs. Ige emphasized that they have wide range of Corporate social responsibility programmes but this partnership with Red Cross and government agencies is very crucial to ensure traffic rules are obeyed by road users in the country to reduce road crashes.
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According to her, they are expecting the awareness campaigns to touch the lives of parents, children and grandparents at the grassroots for impactful results.
She revealed that the flag-off of the Programme will commence in Lagos with 16.5 million people and Abuja with 4 million people to ensure safety of their lives.
The Managing Director of Red Cross Nigeria, Dr. Usman Emmanuel Bassi stressed that the core end of the project is to enlighten the general public especially road users and stakeholders in the transportation sector on road safety.
He reiterated that they are working closely with Prudential Zenith Life Insurance to provide the necessary awareness and training for major stakeholders on the road sector.
” Averagely, we see that 2.1 million road crashes happened in the country with FCT Abuja and Lagos on high level which we’re starting with these locations to curb the situation after which we can cast it down to other states of the Federation.
The Managing Director posited that on their part as Red Cross they are reassuring provision of basic first aid and training for drivers since they’re the first contact during accident cases.
He revealed that the programme will be flagged off in the two major cities for six months between January to June, 2025
The Representative of the Corp Marshall, Corp Commander Danladi Boyi Apaji said “crashes can be prevented but in Nigeria context the negligence of drivers is responsible for high rates of road crashes in the country.
“Sometimes we feel that road crashes cannot happen to us and we always relax therefore we’re working collaboratively to reduce these roads crashes.
He explained that the safe steps road safety’ are in tune with their core mandate to save lives and properties in the country therefore they’re ready to partner with any organization to combat the situation.
While acknowledging the life insurance company for the initiative he called on the public to adhere strictly to the road traffic signs to reduce the accident rate in the country.
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