The Federal Road Safety Corps(FRSC) in Oyo State has cautioned motorists against distracted driving, stressing that many crashes on the highway were largely due to drivers’ carelessness.

FRSC sector commander in Oyo State, Rosemary Alo, stated this at a news conference heralding the command’s Ember months public enlightenment and sensitisation campaigns on Monday in Ibadan.

Ms Alo said that the theme of the campaign is “Take Responsibility for your Safety, Stop Distracted Driving”.

According to her, the sensitisation campaign is aimed at boosting drivers’ understanding of the consequences of their actions, so as to be better equipped to make responsible and safety-conscious decisions.

The FRSC boss said that drivers’ negative attitudes such as phone calls, watching movies, and replying to text messages while driving always cause distraction, which had sent many passengers to early grave.

She urged the public to discard myths and misconceptions about ember months, noting that the months remained the same like every other month and should not be demonised.

According to her, many drivers always want to up their games during the Ember months by increasing their working hours and number of trips so as to make more money during the rush of the festive period.

ThIs Ms Alo said, always leads to fatigue, speed violation, overloading and other factors that could lead to Road Traffic Crashes(RTC).

The sector commander noted that the Corps would work with other sister agencies to ensure proper monitoring, swift emergency response and enforcement of clampdown of rickety vehicles during 2025 ember months, particularly during Christmas and new year festive period.

She noted that the public enlightenment and sensitisation campaigns would feature town hall meetings, media engagements, motorcades, visits to parks, markets, religious gatherings and other public places.

Earlier, the FRSC Corps Marshal, Shehu Mohammed, in his remarks, delivered by the Sector Commander, reiterated that the theme of 2025 ember months campaign reinforced the view that human factor was one of the major causes of road crashes.

He added that the theme also drew attention to the fact that drivers were largely responsible for crashes on the highways.

Mr Mohammed said that the crash statistics for the “2024 Operation Zero”, carried out between December 15, 2024 to January 15, 2025 revealed that 432 persons were killed; 2,070 persons were injured out of 533 reported cases of road crashes.

According to him, the records also showed that the major causes of those crashes were driver fatigue, overloading of persons, conveyance of persons in haulage vehicles and traveling with fuel in plastic containers.

“Apparently, this shows that drivers’ behaviour is a fundamental element in determining safety on our highways. Therefore, the choice of the 2025 End-of-Year campaign theme was deliberate and well thought-out.

“The theme has been carefully chosen to address road traffic infringements by drivers which were largely responsible for the previous road crash records.

“In line with our commitment to achieve the desired outcome of the 2025 end of year campaign, the FRSC has mapped out the many actionable measures for hitch-free motoring during and after the Christmas and new year festive season, “ he said.

(NAN)