FOR a long time, the Government has been struggling to ensure that road traffic accidents which have become a big source of worry are reduced.
The Government has applied many measures to drivers who drive dangerously causing death to other road users.
The measures include weekend sentencing of those drivers who are in the habit of drinking beer when they were driving.
The Road Traffic and Safety Agency (RTSA) has even established a rule – Don’t Drink and drive but despite such rules and others, accidents continue to happen appallingly and about 2,000 deaths occur in the country annually due to accidents.
While many accidents are caused by drunk drivers, there are many that are caused by non drinking drivers and reasons vary from vehicles developing faults such as tyrebursts due to over-speeding.
Some accidents are also caused by tired drivers who dose off while driving.
You may wonder why the Eavesdropper is writing about accidents in this column today, but I just want to share with you what I heard at a funeral gathering in Masala Township in Ndola two weeks ago.
At funerals, especially at night, people come up with various topics ranging from politics, soccer and day to day current affairs.
At these funerals, many arguments are raised and at some point, you would think people especially those who are drunk would fight. The good thing is that it is rare to find people fighting at these places where they converge to mourn their departed loved ones such as relatives and friends.
Several different subjects were raised as we were seated around a borne fire to warm ourselves very late at night or was it very early in the morning and it was at a time people who were contributing to the topics had seemingly run out of what to say and were dosing off when someone who came to be known as a truck driver started telling us how some long journey truck drivers suffer on the roads and how they speed to beat time to avoid being arrested  at some weigh bridges with their overloaded trucks at the expense of losing their life.
The man who is a truck driver with a company in Ndola said  speeding was inevitable to some drivers because they had to go through the weigh bridges without their trucks being impounded even when they were carrying cargo with abnormal tonnage.
But how was this to happen? What magic were drivers using to let officers at weigh bridges allow their trucks overloaded with cargo go through?
One thing that came to my mind was bribery. It is very common for drivers to oil the hands of road traffic police officers, but it certainly did not cross my mind that even officers at weigh bridges could be oiled.
If that was the case, what did this truck driver mean by beating time to avoid being arrested with trucks overloaded with cargo at weigh bridges?
Well, the truck driver went ahead to explain what really happened if one was to beat time.
It was not the drivers themselves who personally bribed the officers.
According to the truck driver, arrangements were made between the truck owners and some officers at weigh bridges, perhaps even with road traffic police officers, were on duty at the time those trucks were in transit and were to pass through those weigh bridges and they were paid well in advance to facilitate the passage of the overloaded trucks.
What that means is that the owners of the trucks communicated the time when those officers would be on duty.
Say if the truck was using the Great North Road, the drivers should know that a group of officers at a certain weigh bridge would be on duty from say 06:00 hours to 15:00 hours and to beat time, the drivers should make sure that they went through the weigh bridges before those officers changed shifts with others who did not know about those arrangements.
The truck drivers who were carrying cargo to various destinations moved in convoys in order for them to reach the weigh bridges at targeted times at almost the same time. It is for this reason that it was important the truck drivers were to move at the same speed.
Those who remained behind had to over speed to make sure that they caught up with their friends in the bid of beating time.
The man explained that because of these arrangements, many accidents had happened.
“If you remained behind for 30 minutes, you have to cover up by  speeding in order to catch up with your friends and beat time. If you can’t catch up and find that your friends had passed those weigh bridges and the time that those officers with such arrangements had knocked off, you have to risk to go through making your own arrangements by dipping into your pockets to be allowed to pass if you are lucky and your truck not impounded for overloading,” the truck driver explained.
He revealed that in an event they failed to beat time and those officers who knew about the arrangements had knocked off, the drivers had to park their trucks to wait up to the time when those officers would report for work – may be from 20:00 to 05:00 hours the following day.
Could this be the reason why we usually find trucks parked at lay byes at times?
The driver narrated that it was at individual driver’s own risk to lose track of his friends because when he remained behind and he had to park, especially at night to wait for proper time to reach the weigh bridges at given times, chances were that highway thieves would siphon his diesel and steal his battery.
“When you park alone or may be with your lorry mate at night, chances are that thieves will attack you. They often siphon the diesel, steal batteries and at times they get the spare wheels. If you are unfortunate enough, they will even grab money from you.
“At one time I failed to beat time. I was with my lorry mate when we decided to park and sleep at a lay by. At 02:00 hours when we were to start off, I started the engine but it couldn’t kick. When I checked the fuel gauge, it was empty. My lorry mate got out of the truck and found that the lid and the lock to the tank were on the floor. The diesel was siphoned. The battery was also tampered with because we found the terminals loose and the bars holding it were bruised but they could not give in,” explained the driver.
What was he going to tell his bosses? The truck had been filled with diesel and it could not have run out after travelling only a few kilometers. Obviously he was going to be accused of having siphoned the diesel and selling it. Certainly, together with his lorry mate, they were going to be fired.
The two men remained awake until dawn.
“We had to contribute our money to buy diesel at a nearby grass-thatched shelter where vendors were selling fuel. It was possible we were buying our own fuel which had been siphoned,” the truck driver explained.
Because of having a dry tank, he experienced an airlock which took a long time to deal with and by the time this was done, the sun was beginning to rise.
When he finally started off, he found a truck he had been earlier following on departure from Tanzania  had overturned in Nakonde. The truck was one of the six on the convoy from his company.
Fortunately the driver and his lorry mate had sustained minor injuries and had been rushed to hospital.
He found another truck from another company in the bush after failing to negotiate a curve in Mpika due to over speeding.
In Serenje, he found another truck involved in a head-on collision after trying to overtake another truck which was not on its convoy without the driver noticing that there was an approaching truck in front of him.
“By the time we were reaching KapiriMposhi, four trucks had been involved in accidents which could have been avoided but could not because of over speeding in a bid to beat time and avoid being impounded because of overloading,” he said.
After the driver finished telling this story, I wondered whether terrible accidents would be curbed with such crafty happenings on our roads.
In order to keep their jobs which are so hard to come by, some drivers become innocent victims.
They either have to dance to their employers’ tunes or face dismissals if they don’t follow orders which could even lead to their deaths.
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