Rwanda National Police

Members of the Scouting and Guiding movements have launched a week-long campaign aimed at educating different categories of people on safer road usage as part of the ongoing Gerayo Amahoro campaign spearheaded by Rwanda National Police (RNP).The campaign is part of the yearly Scouting and Guiding Week launched on February 15, under the theme: “Guide, Scout, take the lead to tackle youth challenges."The week is an opportunity for scouts and guides from across Rwanda to revive the promise of leaving this world a better place.The scouts and guides mostly delivered road safety messages in taxi parks of Musanze, Muhanga, Rubavu, Huye, Kayonza, Remera, Nyabugogo and Kigali Downtown.

They dwelt much on respect for traffic signposts, individual responsiveness when using the road and doing away with dangerous behaviors related to using a phone while driving, riding and crossing the road, and drunken driving; which contribute to road carnage.

Laëtitia Mujawamariya, the Membership Growth Coordinator in Guides Association in Rwanda, said that as Rwanda youth, they decided to add a voice and support national efforts towards creating a road safety culture.

“As Rwandan young people, who are joined by our friends from the region, we are happy to join the Police to contribute to prevention of fatal accidents, through awareness,” Mujawamariya said.

“In this Guides Week, we want to supplement the Police efforts in road safety campaign, reach out to a wider audience, sharing road safety messages with the purpose of changing behaviors on how people use the road,” Mujawamariya explained.

Their target road users, she says, are pedestrians, taxi-moto operators and drivers before rolling out the campaign in schools.

Although accidents reduced by 17 percent last year (4,661 in 2019 compared to 5,611 accidents in 2018), pedestrians were the majority victims with 223 fatalities, 184 motorcyclists and 130 cyclists.

Following the launch of Gerayo Amahoro campaign in May last year, accidents dropped by 42 percent in the last four months of the same year.

Chief Inspector of Police (CIP) Marie-Gorette Umutesi, Police spokesperson for the Central region, thanked them for educating Rwandans to save lives.

“The young people are the powerhouse of the country; we believe your campaign will further create impact by saving lives on roads,” CIP Umutesi said.

In Kigali, the campaign will be conducted in bus terminals as well as on roads and other public places in different parts of the country.