Gulu- Four market vendors have been confirmed dead and 18 others seriously injured in a Monday night accident along Opwonya-Walter Road in Gulu city.
The accident involved a truck registration number UBF 743B (Canter) that was carrying the vendors from the market.
Faridah Nampiima, the traffic police spokesperson says the truck lost control and knocked a building killing four people on spot.
“The injured people were rushed to Gulu referral hospital for first aid treatment, while the identities of the four people have not been established.” She says adding that their bodies were conveyed to Gulu regional referral hospital for postmortem examination.
Nampiima says the motor vehicle has been taken to Gulu CPS for IOV inspection as investigations for the cause of the accident continue.
The incident comes a few days after five people were killed and seven others injured in an accident involving a Fuso truck transporting cattle from Kotido District on Soroti –Mbale highway on Wednesday last week
Also five died and seven others injured after an Isuzu Elf truck lost control and rammed into boda boda riders at Kabuusu round about in Rubaga Division, Kampala last Thursday.
The traffic police spokesperson on Monday disclosed that a total of 257 people were killed between October 1st and 29th 2022.
Nampiima attributed most of these accidents to reckless driving which includes disregard for the rules on the road, driving without proper cautions and over speeding. She also cited failure to use signals, disobeying traffic signs, drifting from one lane to the other, distracted driving, using mobile phones while driving, driving under the influence of alcohol and drugs, failing to stop for pedestrian at cross points as other causes of accidents.
Nampiima said that driving vehicles which are not in good mechanical condition also contributed to the accidents and had they been avoided or respected, those fatalities wouldn’t have been registered.
She noted that 33086 people were issued with express penalty tickets, 6358 of which for careless driving, 7278 for driving vehicles in a dangerous mechanical condition, 1,790 for over speeding, 572 for using phones while driving among others.
