The Causes Of Road Accidents In Malaysia

Time to time, half a million of Malaysians died because of road accidents and the highest cases of road accidents are caused by the drivers behaviour, equipment failure, the road conditions and infrastructure. Due to road accidents many people have lost their family members or close friends. Besides, the road accidents many affect the government when they have to repair for the broken infrastructure that caused by the accident like lamp stand, road divider, cleaning people blood from the road, and many more. It also will give a traffic jam for a while to all drivers. According to Road Transport department research (2002) accident casualty and deaths by vehicles in Malaysia from 2000-2006, the number of road accidents increased to 400 cases and it decreased in 2006 as only about 600 cases (21,600 cases ) had been reported. The first thing that contributes to the reason for the road accidents in Malaysia is the drivers behaviour. Humans always do mistakes. When a problem or unwanted thing happens, they tend to blame somebody or something else for what they have done. Most people who are involved in an accident believe the other party involved could have done something different to avoid the accident. According to the Royal Malaysian Police, PDRM (2006) reports 90% of accidents happen from this reason. Moreover speeding has also caused quite a number of accidents. Actually, until recently many drivers, especially male driver took the chance of night time driving in federation and state roads. PDRM, (2006) reports the faster a vehicle, the greater the risk of an accident. Speeding, even if the vehicle is going five miles per hour over, in the wrong place at the wrong time, it can cause death to somebody. Speeding is also based on the traffic on an area, road conditions, weather and lighting. When driver speeding, they risk their lives so they have be alerted about what condition will they face. Despite all major highways have speed trap, it still cannot prevent drivers to speed and get into trouble, such as an accident. In addition, careless drivers are another drivers behaviour that causes the road accidents. This factor is the highest factor that drivers get involved in road accidents. Some drivers not only speed but also drive recklessly, break road rules, do not have their vehicle license and beat traffic lights. Moreover, drivers either man or women cannot prevent to be careless driver. The main causes that drivers become careless while driving on roads are

talking on cell phone, eating, falling asleep due to tiredness, driving under the influence of alcohol and so on. Due to small mistakes can cause a big problem to others who use the road to be involved in the accidents. However, the most important cause of an accident is aggressive drivers and selfish attitude. From e-how.com, described, safe standards are manufactured for modern cars by engineers to minimize the effects of accident. The aggressive drivers and selfish attitude are the most impossible thing to change. The examples of aggressive drivers behaviour and selfish attitude are aggressive tailgating, failure to signal, and failure to use the right way side. Aggressive tailgating happens when they follow in front of other vehicles too close. With two vehicles driving too close in high speed, there will be a huge accident if unexpected things happen on the road, such as animals crossing the road which require front vehicles to stop immediately or evade from hitting the animal. Furthermore, failure to signal when taking left or right road at the corner of the road causes accidents to happen. When this happens, other vehicles do not know which way they want to go either left or right. Especially heavy vehicles, do not see where they want to turn if they do not turn on the signal light from their vehicle. There are a lot of problems happen if driver do not use the right way side, it will make other driver mad. When other driver angry, they will flash light at the back of the failure driver vehicles, because of them drive to slow also in wrong way side of the road. Other example is every festive seasons like Chinese New Year, Hari Raya Aidilfitri, Deepavali, Christmas including New Years, Malaysians are always excited feeling of going back to their villages or better known as balik kampung. With the excited feeling of going back to their hometowns, many of them and their families trying their best to reach their home as quickly as they can. Thus they will become selfish and do not care about their safety. Some of them will take express buses to arrive at their home to avoid driving a car at night. However they will be unlucky if they get selfish and careless bus drivers attitudes. The most dangerous transportations are heavy vehicles like buses and lorries because they are big and easy to hit small vehicles. Other than that, many selfish motorcyclists do not follow traffic rules fasten safety helmet properly. Another factor that is listed as one of the causes of road accident is equipment failure of a vehicle. Smartmotorist.com (2005), states that the type of equipment failure are loss of brakes, tire blow outs or tread separation, and suspension failure. Then, 5% of all motorvehicle accidents have reported equipment failure contributes to accidents. All drivers should drive their cars in perfect car condition. So, before driving any vehicle, they have to do some

confirmation. They need to check their vehicles to make it safe to drive or not. For example, they must check the conditions of water, brake, battery and lamp are always be in good condition. There are some drivers that never take care of this problem. They feel it is a small matter to think about the problem and can do it later at any time. They do not care about the safety factor of their cars such as they need to change the worn out tires, when the tires are worn out, the vehicles absolutely cannot grasp the road surface tightly. So, it will be more dangerous during rainy days as the stranglehold between tires and road surface will be more weaker than sunny day condition. Worn out tires can caused the accident easily. Besides, there are many people who cannot accept the fact that almost nine million vehicles in this country are involved in road accident because using of illegal equipment which gain the worst level for everyone. Then, 80 percent of 11 millions of the vehicles in our country use illegal equipment. The president of Persatuan Pemilik kenderaan Bermotor Malaysia (MOVA), Ahmad Zaki Arifin says that more than half from the driver in our country face the risk to involved in accident and death due to this behaviour. Besides, the other reason that causes the accident is the road conditions and infrastructure. Usually, the road will become dangerous in rainy day. It will make the road becomes more slippery for the vehicle for the vehicles to handle. In addition, many potholes could endanger motorists (Road Transport Department, 2002). It is because deep holes can make motorists cannot control their vehicles and will cause the accident. It becomes worst if it involves the motorcyclists. The broken surface of the roads can also create a nightmare for road users. It is because of the road users cannot see the holes while driving. Most accidents that involve potholes happen at night, because at that time many drivers could not recognize the holes when they are driving. Other than that, insufficient and improper of street light that causes an accident. Usually, the street lights are hard to find in village areas. So, the authorities should take care of the village area too. In some places, the street light cannot be used by people because the street light is already broken and not repaired by the authorities. In other case, the insufficient of traffic light also lead us to road accident, interstate highways remain the safest roads because their flow of traffic light is in one direction and it is completed with traffic lights. Many accidents are caused by insufficient of traffic light such as there are no traffic light at one road that is always full with vehicles and produces a huge traffic jam. It will become worst when some drivers do not think about other road users and drive in high speed when taking a corner or change to the other side of road. However, roadway identification signs also play the role to make the roads safe for road users. It is

useful to inform road users to locate and know the road conditions, such as the location of landslide, the location of school, hospitals and many more. If the driver is informed properly the accident will not happen easily. It is possible that motorcyclists also need specific lanes for them. They should be separated from other big users like car, lorry, bus and the other type of transportation that are bigger than motorcycles. It will make them more safe and secure from unwanted accident. In conclusion, driver behaviours, the equipment failure of vehicle, as well as the road conditions and infrastructure seem to be the causes of road accidents in Malaysia. In order to reduce the total amount of road accidents, the first thing that should we do is change our attitude. In addition, we also need to be alerted about our vehicle condition and always check them. The rate of road accidents in our country today has become a nightmare for all of us. So, the authorities may need to do a drastic step to overcome this major problem. They need to use their power to serve the best road conditions and infrastructure for us. We need to realize that our life is the most valuable thing. Drive safety and save our soul.