The heads of provincial traffic safety committees may face disciplinary action in serious traffic accidents continue to occur in their localities.
 |
| Serious traffic accidents continue to occur |
At the meeting on traffic safety on March 21, Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc said in early 2010, there had been a decline in accidents, deaths and injuries compared to the same period last year, but he cautioned that the results may be temporary anomaly.
"The results are great but I think road accidents still pose a great danger." he said.
According to Phuc, as long as the road widths remain as narrow as they currently are, then authorities need to focus on traffic control. Strong measures are required to deal with violations or lax management.
Localities, especially Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City have been told to up traffic infrastructure construction in order to prevent traffic jams and accidents. Concurrently, authorities need to clear railway and waterway corridors by limiting the passage of boats and private vehicles.
Phuc said he will report to the government to issue more regulations on setting the penalties for management agencies that failed in their work, and to further limit personal vehicles use. "This is an urgent matter. It affects human life and requires drastic measures." He said.
Vice chairman of the National Traffic Safety Committee Nguyen Hoang Hiep said Vietnam currently had the highest number of vehicles per capita in the world, especially motorbikes. He further said, "With that many vehicles being added to the roads while infrastructure is only slowly improving, traffic jams and accidents are not likely to decline."
Addressing the responsibility of management agencies in traffic control, Hiep said the management agencies are currently criticised but aren’t penalised for their poor performance. However, the heads of provincial traffic safety committees would now face strict disciplinary measures if serious accidents happened or the number of accidents surged over a consecutive three-year period in their localities.
