A brush with a hit-and-run drunk driver

Dying is too easy in Ghana because several factors prematurely push us into hot graves. One of such death-push factors is vehicular accidents that are caused by reckless drivers who come from their lunatic fringes and as if on grand suicide missions, use vehicles as weapons of mass destruction to strike innocent people.

Last Sunday afternoon, I bore witness to hit-and-run drunk driving when I found myself in a freak accident that was gifted to me by a character who had arrived from a drunken post-funeral lunatic fringe to take over an otherwise peaceful road.

The story: A certain Gabriel Kwame Agbo and two others were reeking of alcohol after a funeral. One of them was boldly and recklessly driving a white Toyota pick-up with registration number GV385R, belonging to the Registrar General’s Department. A distance away on a quite Madina back-road, I noticed the pick-up coming at me in a zigzag manner. Sensing catastrophe, I quickly packed my car, terrified. Within a minute, the ‘mad’ vehicle came smashing into my car on the driver’s side where I was seated. Then, mindlessly, the driver and drunken crew took off with award-winning bravado.

Swiftly, witnesses chased him to record the vehicle registration number and to bring him back to the accident scene. Then, the mind-blowing post-accident foolishness began. The three courageous drunkards set out to senselessly quarrel, amidst a lot of chaos. I felt as if I was watching a horror movie in which I was a character. Fortunately, I’m alive to share this story.

The lesson I learned is that all it takes to see death face-to-face is a split second incident. My experience brought to mind the many heart-breaking news stories that regularly hit the news space. Yet, these nation-wide senseless accidents are not abating. Here are a few of such painfully annoying stories.

On June 30th, 2009, a GNA story headlined, “Hit and run driver killed two, injured three others at Agona Kwanyako.” In this story, one knuckle-headed Emmanuel Opoku Odoom, aged 19, surrendered himself to the Divisional MTTU at Agona Swedru four days after he had knocked down and killed two people on the spot.

In late January this year, another GNA headline screamed, “Driver arrested for drunk driving.” The driver, Bernard Brew, a 25-year-old agent of Multi Television, drove a vehicle while under the influence of alcohol. He was arrested by the Asante-Mampong police at a barrier on the Kumasi-Mampong road while speeding in his attempt to recklessly overtake a long queue of vehicles. He was not only reeking of alcohol but he had a bottle of Castle Bridge gin in his car. As a result of the arrest, society was saved from his lunatic spree.

In a matter of four months between late last year and mid-January this year, four cases of hit-and-run accidents were reported in the Oda municipality. In one of them, the victim did not die on the spot. If the killer-driver had rushed the male adult pedestrian to the hospital after the accident, he might have survived. In two other instances at Akyem Akroso and Akyem Bantama, a man and a school boy, respectively, were knocked down and killed by speeding hit-and-run drivers.

What these stories have in common are audacity, speeding, impatience, recklessness, foolishness and heartlessness. Lunatic driving produces orphans and widows/widowers. Yet, some drivers remain possessed with the vehicular fetish, losing their minds as if they can live forever.

Yet, respectable organizations harbour dangerous drivers. It’s not only taxi and tro-tro drivers who carry licences to kill. To my utter shock, my initial investigations at the Registrar General’s Department revealed that Gabriel Kwame Agbo is a known ‘trouble-maker’ with disciplinary problems and alcoholic tendencies. So I asked an administrator of the department, “How many people would he have to maim and/or kill with a state vehicle before he is relieved of his position as a driver?”

Vehicular accidents in Ghana have been described by various people as a menace, foe and a deadly disease. The life of everyone – everyone – is in danger. You’re in danger either in a car or as a pedestrian – young or old, male or female. It’s no respecter of persons or location unless you become a recluse and lock yourself up inside a room. But even that, a lunatic driver could find you to maim or kill.

Apart from the misery of physical and psychological pain and deaths, road accidents cost Ghana US$165 million every year. Think of what that kind of money can accomplish for mother/father Ghana!

A vehicle is nothing but a pack of tin and rubber. But worse of all, it is a weapon of destruction. Its destructiveness is heightened when the judgment of the operator of the vehicle is impaired.

The management of the aftermath of an accident reveals a lot about a person. A hit-and-run driver might be hiding something (alcohol, drugs) or trying to protect and/or absolve him/herself from responsibility. A display of unnecessary patapaa bravado attitude is the ultimate test of a person’s character. It is, truly, where the rubber meets the road, where the essence of character fully shines through.

The thought that a person should run away because he/she thinks he/she can get away regardless of the consequences of the suffering of a victim (even in death), is beyond cowardliness. It is crack foolishness and lacks any show of humanity.

Dealing with the police after an accident is another ball game altogether. Police procedures are lousy and tend to discourage victims to desire to seek out the police, take problems to them, expect any help from them, and to have hope in them. In my experience, I witnessed no hurry to find and arrest the culprit despite all the superbly relevant information I gathered about him from the accident scene, which I dutifully handed over to the police.

The indirect message transmitted to me consistently was that I carried the burden of the problem. For instance, I had the chance to write my statement a whopping 22 hours after the accident. One of the witnesses wrote his statement three days after although he had voluntarily gone to the police station during the first hour when everything was fresh.

On Wednesday, the IGP, Paul Tawiah, pleaded for help in redeeming the sinking image of the Ghana Police Service. Mr Tawiah, charity begins at home! On the ground zero of police operation – at the Police Station level – the Ghana Police Service grabs and nibbles and chews and eats its own stinky tail.

My case only received the deserved attention because the third day after the accident coincided with the first day of assumption of duty of a new commander who happens to be my personal friend. Prior to that, my case had been placed on a toss-toss nonsensical dance that was going no-where.

BACK-STORY: In all of these, I bore witness that human beings are made for goodness. Two angels, Arnold Dedzo and Michael Asare provided loving assistance at the accident scene and thereafter. David Eklu has truly “hit the ground running” as the Commander of the Madina Police. All my fingers are crossed that he would succeed in eliminating (reducing?) the lunacy and bring sanity to Madina/Adenta.