General Taban, the Director of Traffic Police in Central Equatoria State. (Photo: Michael Daniel).

The Directorate of Traffic Police in Central Equatoria state said it has registered 161 deaths due to road accidents in the year 2023.

The figure indicates a reduction in such cases compared to 2022, where 191 people were killed in road crashes.

Major General Zakharia Michael Taban, the state Director of Traffic Police said his office recorded a total of 3,165 accidents last year.

According to General Taban, these include 116 fatal accidents involving vehicles and 45 similar deaths involving motorcycles.

“If we want to talk about traffic accidents in the year 2023, we recorded about 161 accidents that caused death, while we recorded about 191 in the year 2022,” he said.

“This is a decrease of approximately 30 cases from the year 2022. Of the total death accidents of 161, there are about 116 fatal accidents caused by cars and about 45 deaths due to motorcycles.”

While the police data shows the number of deaths due to accidents has reduced, General Taban said, however, that the number of accidents has increased in comparison with the previous year.

He attributed the accidents to reckless driving and driving under the influence of alcohol, among other things.

“Most of the reasons for these accidents are recklessness, increased speed, drugs, and driving under the influence of alcohol, as well as the lack of compliance and familiarity of road users with traffic rules and allowing children under the legal age to drive.”