A3 Road has in the past 11 months claimed the lives of over 45 people. Late last year in Parliament, it was revealed that out of the 736 people who were involved in accidents that occurred on the A3 in the previous five years, 94 people died and 241 sustained serious injuries, while 401 survived with minor injuries. Furthermore, out of the 1,085 accidents that occurred along the A3 in the last five years, 75 were fatal, while 1,010 were non-fatal. No1 District Traffic Officer, Robert Mmese has acknowledged that A3 Road is old and has to be revamped saying their progress reports have proven that road accidents on the same highway are largely attributed to driver error. He said the progress report indicates that the Mafungo-Hubona accident which occurred last July and claimed the lives of 17 people was caused by driver’s error from the involved cars. The tragic fatal accident involved two public mini-buses and a Toyota Dyna.
The two mini-buses were travelling from Francistown to Sowa Town and Maitengwe respectively. The vehicles collided with a Toyota Dyna that was travelling in the opposite direction but took the wrong lane. Mmese emphasised that the accidents occurred due to drivers’ errors, not road conditions as the portion where the accident occurred didn’t have problems. He said the same thing applied to an accident that occurred near the Marapong turn-off and claimed the lives of 23 people adding one of the drivers encountered an error which resulted in the crash. He stated the cyclist who was allegedly involved in a collision was not there because he was 100 metres away. Mmese stated that the accident also occurred in an area where the road was not in a bad state. He indicated that in the case of the accident which claimed the life of a Botswana Unified Revenue Service employee, the causality occurred due to mechanical problems, not road-related issues. Bus owner, Lawa Holding released a statement on Facebook following the fatal accident. The statement read: “As you are aware of the circumstances surrounding the accident, we apprise that the driver lost control of the bus 20km away from Francistown due to breakage of the upper and lower tension bar circumed by the status of the road. As a result, the bus swindled and rolled before coming to rest on the side of the road.”
