When one travels through most of the major roads in Nigeria and sees government officials checking the Safety of vehicles on those roads, one wonders which comes first - safety of the roads or safety and conditions of the vehicles. This is because both the vehicles and the roads are bad.

Let us look at both sides of the coin and juxtapose them for proper analysis. 

Safety of the Vehicles. In ideal situations, vehicles should be in proper condition before they are put on the roads whether for commercial or private use.  We have seen situations where vehicles and passengers got stranded because of lack of spare tyre in the vehicle. Some vehicles carry spare tyres, but the tyres are not serviceable, hence cannot be used when the need arises.  Government officials such as Road Safety Officers and Vehicle Inspection Officers who are supposed to arrest and punish the offenders are busy collecting bribe from them and leaving them to drive without spare tyres. Can you beat that! 

Documents/particulars of many vehicles on the road today  are either missing or were not obtained at all! Some Road Safety officials who routinely stop and check particulars of these  vehicles cannot claim ignorance  of this because passengers of most of these commercial vehicles observe the road safety officials clandestinely collect bribe from the motorists.  This demeaning action does not only deny the government  the expected  revenue  from offenders; it also portrays the public officers in a very bad light.

Side mirror, brake/ tail light, windscreen  wipers, etc of most of the vehicles on the roads are not functional and the vehicle inspection officers are aware of this. Rather than ensure that the affected vehicles are impounded and the drivers reprimanded accordingly, the government officials responsible for this task simply take some kickbacks from the owners of such vehicles at the detriment of their lives and other road users. This reprehensive attitude must stop!

Safety of the Roads. For a very long time now,  road construction and maintenance in Nigeria, especially in urban areas,  has not been encouraging.  Successive  governments would come and  make promises to build and repair roads,  only to embark  on the project  and abandon  it midway. Where roads are constructed,  it is  either the job is poorly done or substandard  materials are used in constructing  the roads! When this happens,  such roads wear  out within a short period of time, and the situation worsens  when the expected repair and regular maintenance do not come on time.

Let us quickly point out that some major cities that have deplorable roads could be quickly fixed  in times of political campaigns by political office aspirants, who suddenly become benevolent in other to win the people’s votes. Unfortunately, such roads, which are often hurriedly done, do not stand the test of time. No sooner  the roads are constructed than they go bad again  - even worse than they were before they  were hurriedly fixed!

Interestingly, these Road Safely and Vehicle Inspection Officers position themselves at the bad section of the roads to check vehicle’s fitness to ply the roads - the bad roads! The big question to ask here is: are these government officials happy that the roads  are bad, because they take advantage of it as they easily stop  vehicles for inspection at the bad  spot. This is a pity and regrettable  though because it falls  short of modern operation of road safety and vehicle inspection  officials.

When erring  vehicles are arrested,   they are seldom booked  and charged  accordingly; rather, they are made to pay for their sins right there at the spot and asked to go and sin no more.

Please note that our illustration  of Road Safety and Vehicle Inspection officials is not a deliberate attempt to paint  the organizations black; rather, it is an attempt to point out the misdeeds carried out by most of them and the need to check their activities  for  better performance.

From our analysis so far,  safety of  the roads should be given a priority because  many road users suffer untold hardship due to no fault  of theirs. When the roads are in good condition,  the road Safety and Vehicle Inspection officials can employ the right mechanism to arrest and punish  law breakers