More than 1 400 killed on SA roads during festive break
Transport Minister Fikile Mbalula released the latest festive season statistics for the year 2022/23 on Tuesday morning.
A total of 1 451 people died on the country’s roads between 1 December and 11 January, which is a 13,9% drop compared to the 1 685 deaths recorded in the previous year.
All provinces, with the exception of Gauteng, have reported decreases in road deaths.
WATCH: Minister Mbalula gives breakdown of provincial stats. Gauteng is the only province that registered an increase from 275 to 290 fatalities in this period #FestiveSeason #RoadAccidentStats pic.twitter.com/IPEUeG3qtq
— Jacaranda News (@JacaNews) January 17, 2023
Mbalula said the Road Traffic Management Corporation has been tasked with delving deeper into what contributed to the increase in Gauteng, adding that alcohol is the likely contributor.
“We still need to look into that but I can tell you it’s drinking and driving. The RTMC will have to analyse for us what went wrong in Gauteng when we expected it, as an urban area, to drop the numbers even further.”
According to the minister, most crashes occurred between 17:00 and 22:00, particularly on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.
“Most fatalities were recorded during the weeks of 15 to 21 December and 22 to 28 December 2022. Fatalities recorded over this period were 327 and 316 respectively,” revealed Mbalula.
The latest figures also show that most fatal crashes involved light motor vehicles, followed by light delivery vehicles, minibusses, and trucks.
