By DayakDaily Team
KUCHING, Jan 17: Parents and guardians need to be responsible for ensuring the safety of children when on the road and not rely solely on enforcement agencies, says Road Transport Department (JPJ) director-general Aedy Fadly Ramli.
In a TVS news report, he was commenting on the Stutong Baru accident, caused by a 16-year-old boy who didn’t have a driver’s license and resulted in the deaths of five people.
He shared his sadness over the accident, stressing that road safety is everyone’s responsibility and not just the enforcement agencies.
“The responsibility to ensure road safety does not lie solely with enforcement agencies but rather with the individuals themselves, including parents and guardians.
“What I have seen is that we need more understanding at the family level, where parents are the ones who need to be responsible for ensuring the safety of their children when on the road,” he stressed.
He said this to reporters after paying a courtesy call to the Sarawak Governor Tun Pehin Sri Dr Wan Junaidi Tuanku Jaafar at Astana Sarawak today.
On Tuesday (Jan 14), an accident occurred along Stutong Baru after a car from Jalan Lapangan Terbang heading towards Jalan Setia Raja lost control and skidded into the opposite road, crashing into two motorcycles and two cars passing by on the road.
Previously, Kuching district police chief ACP Mohd Farhan Lee Abdullah was reported to have said that following the accident, four victims were confirmed dead at the scene while the fifth victim died receiving treatment at the red zone of the Sarawak General Hospital (SGH).
The 16-year-old driver of the car that crashed suffered neck injuries and was arrested after receiving treatment. He was noted to not possess a driver’s license.
The case is being investigated under Section 41 (1) of the Road Transport Act 1987, which is causing death by reckless or dangerous driving.
If convicted, the offender can be sentenced to imprisonment for not less than five years and not more than ten years and a fine of not less than RM20,000 and not more than RM50,000. — DayakDaily
