…Warns against drunk driving
Maduka Nweke
Wapic Insurance, one of the leading motor insurance companies in Nigeria, has organised a training aimed at increasing the number of safety-conscious road users in the country.
Managing Director/CEO, Wapic Insurance, Yinka Adekoya, in her opening remarks at a press briefing said that by the training, the underwriter wants to show that proactive risk avoidance is a tenet it preaches to stakeholders. She urged Nigerians to avoid driving while drunk.
In his presentation, Mr. Bode Ojeniyi, an Executive Director in the company, noted that the underpinning message of the ‘Safety-on-Wheels’ campaign to be launched tomorrow was to raise the number of safety-conscious road users in Nigeria. “As a social-focused risk advisory initiative, the ‘Safety-on-Wheels’ campaign is conceived to empower Nigerians with relevant knowledge and apposite skills that will reduce road accidents and raise general awareness about our collective road safety responsibility.”
Targeted at raising collective consciousness about the need for road users to imbibe and practice appropriate road-use culture in Nigeria, the initiative is an educational advocacy campaign executed in partnership with relevant government agencies including the Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) and Lagos State Transport Management Authority (LASTMA).
The campaign, which commence on Saturday, February 17, 2018, at the Teslim Balogun Stadium with 1000 drivers across Lagos State, was to educate participants about safe road-use practices, importance of adherence to road traffic regulations and appropriate road as well as vehicle maintenance cultures. Stakeholders at the event were drawn from, the road management and transport owners in the country.
“Worried about the spate of causalities and deaths from road accidents, validated by National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) data that “of the 11,363 road accidents recorded in 2016, resulting in 5,053 resulted in death.”
Adekoya, Managing Director, Wapic Insurance, noted that, “we are aware that road accidents have far-reaching emotional, financial and psychological effects on families and the workforce, which in turn have significant negative effects on socio-economic facets of the society…
As an organisation, Wapic Insurance is triggered by this awareness to collaborate with other stakeholders to combat this menace with the ‘Safety-on-Wheels’ Initiative. Our plan is to take the campaign across the country starting with Lagos State.
“In the Wapic Insurance ‘Safety-on-Wheels’ initiative, drivers will not only benefit from the road-use trainings, they will also participate in a series of eye and blood pressure tests conducted by a team of qualified medical personnel to determine their personal physical roadworthiness. Participating drivers will undertake specialised trainings, which will equip them with working knowledge of road use and safety commandments.
Ojeniyi noted that Wapic Insurance has invested in the initiative and built credible partnership with state and federal road safety bodies to provide quality trainings to all beneficiaries and provide them with necessary orientation with a view to raising social advocates for road safety and build a community of people who know that road use rules are to protect and not to restrain.
He further said, “with creating sustainable value for the society at the centre of Wapic Insurance’s social responsibility activities, the company intends to drive social progression and build safe road use culture in Nigerians by ensuring that motorists, passengers, pedestrians and the society at large are knowledgeable about road-use commandments that guide traffic interactions.
“By this, awareness that safety is not just a personal effort but depends largely on the safety consciousness of other road users will rise to an impressive level, such that every road user takes responsibility for their own safety and others’ by adopting the right attitude on the road.
“Wapic Insurance is a socially responsible corporate citizen with focus on health, education, social empowerment and environment. The company is nationally and internationally acknowledged for its defining roles and social interventions that have consistently enhanced the quality of living and humanity,” he concluded.