There are a considerable number of government stakeholders responsible for enhancing the road safety of Sri Lanka, including a few non-governmental organisations. Day by day, the public transport sector is creating a tangible deterrence to human security when considering the increase in road traffic accidents faced by the public transport sector.
The road public transport sector is covered by the Sri Lanka Transport Board (SLTB) as the government stakeholder, and private buses are owned by the private sector. Rather than luxury buses, semi-luxury and normal buses running long distances are mainly accountable for the public transport sector road traffic accidents taking place.
There are 38,000 crashes on average every year, with about 3,000 fatalities and 8,000 serious injuries. In South Asia, Sri Lanka has the highest rate of traffic fatalities among its closest neighbours. According to a report of the Police, between 1 January and 13 December 2024, there were 2,243 persons who lost their lives in traffic accidents. Moreover, 22,967 traffic accidents were reported during this time, 2,141 of which were fatal, making up 9% of all incidents. In addition, 9,127 minor accidents and 6,500 catastrophic accidents were reported. The Police report highlighted that 198 bus incidents resulted in fatalities in 2024. Further, 50 of these involved buses operated by the SLTB, and 148 involved private buses.
The World Bank report on delivering road safety in Sri Lanka has highlighted that according to the estimates, Sri Lanka's yearly per capita road crash death rate is five times higher than that of the world's top-performing nations and twice that of high-income nations.
The National Council for Road Safety (NCRS) is in charge of building a safe road network for all users and improving road safety management priorities. In particular, the Motor Traffic (Amendment) Act, No. 5 of 1998, created the NCRS. The purpose of this Act was to address road safety concerns and raise the general level of safety in the nation's road transportation system.
There is a huge number of people in the country who are becoming victims of road traffic accidents taking place in the public transport sector. There isn’t significant improvement in preventing road traffic accidents in the public transport sector even though many rules and regulations are implemented by the Government. Long-distance running semi-luxury buses and local buses account for the majority of the road accidents taking place in Sri Lanka. The service of those bus services is accessed by the majority of the middle-income or low-income earning public community of the country, those who don’t have personal vehicles or access to the luxury transport service due to domestic financial issues. The majority of the general public who access those bus services are vulnerable due to their economic background, and, they become victims as passengers when accidents are faced by the public transport sector. When considering the people who become victims of fatal and critical accidents, it is especially required to consider the consequences for them and their families.
According to the United Nations (UN) Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), human security components have gained a broader scope, as they encompass risks to human dignity in addition to military protection. There are mainly seven elements under human security such as economic, food, health, environmental, personal, community and political security. Frequent accidents taking place in the public transport sector, directly and indirectly, create a tangible impact on the country’s human security, mainly in terms of health, personal, economic and food security. If any person who is running his/her family and generating a daily basis income as a labourer becomes the victim of a fatal or critical accident, his/her entire family will collapse. Feeding his/her family, kids’ education, providing medicines and all other fundamental human needs may be hampered if he/she is the only income generator of a particular family. This situation may become further worse if the kids terminate their schooling early due to poverty, and impacts on the health and food security of such families may create an impact on social security as well. As explained by the National Institutes of Health in the United States of America, if any bone damage happens to the elderly, the recovery period varies from several weeks to several months. For a labourer, this period becomes more critical and vulnerable to damage to his entire family life. After such accidents take place, there is no sound reaction initiated by any authority or even the bus owners to look after such long-term affected victims. The situation behind the scenes of their families may become critical in various ways since there is no accountability for looking after them. However, throughout the period, government hospitals look after these victims, spending huge amounts of money to give medical care to them. People who become victims of public transport accidents may have to undergo a serious and critical series of events behind the scenes with long-term disabilities if they don’t have effective income generation, effective medical care and they are unable to fulfill basic human needs, in turn impacting the country’s human security in various ways.
Most of the public transport accidents are taking place because of the simple negligence of the bus drivers. Bus drivers can be identified as the accused of those accidents along with their road traffic violence and negligence as well. The poor maintenance of the roadworthiness of particular buses of the public transport sector, along with the economic crisis, also can be identified as a factor for the increase in road accidents. Moreover, fatigue, poor human behaviour and conduct, the poor education of drivers, having to cover targets, more income generation, aggression, time and distance also contribute to the increase in accidents in the public transport sector.
The Police are using alcohol detectors to detect the presence of alcohol consumed by the driver. When considering the quantity of dangerous and illegal drugs and narcotic items apprehended in Sri Lanka daily, the number of bus drivers consuming illegal and dangerous drugs can increase. Also, since the Police is mainly targeting alcohol-consuming drivers, illegal drugs and narcotics consuming bus drivers may escape without detection. When observing the increasing number of buses facing more dangerous accidents, such as face-to-face accidents and ejecting drivers from the driving seats, etc., it causes us to think from a different angle to study whether those drivers are consuming illegal/dangerous drugs and narcotics while driving buses. Many Police Department traffic officers are deployed on the road to control road traffic violence and road traffic accidents. However, if any person spends less than half an hour on the long-distance connecting ‘A’ graded road, he/she can practically experience and witness many road traffic violations by bus drivers. Even though a considerable number of Police officers are deployed, why are these drivers still competent to violate road traffic rules? Drivers who met with critical accidents were mainly focused on profit rather than the value of human life.
The sensitivity, quick decision-making, quick reactions and situational adaptability of the bus drivers must be evaluated regularly. Hence, it is recommended to conduct medical tests at least twice per year, free of charge, by the Government, to detect and identify dangerous drugs/narcotics, including cannabis-consuming bus drivers and issue separate certificates for them. Also, automated systems must be developed locally to detect road traffic violence where Police officers are not deployed. In addition, the country must immediately develop an automated system for detecting and sending fines to the owner of the bus when violating the traffic rules. Furthermore, it is required to empower and amend the existing law of the country as suitable for punishing road traffic-violating bus drivers. Finally, when considering the risk to the human security of the country due to accidents taking place in the public transport sector, sound rules and regulations must be established immediately to deploy only responsible, authorised, well-monitored and approved bus drivers in the public transport sector.
(The writer is a Military Research Officer at the Institute of National Security Studies, under the Ministry of Defence. The opinions expressed are his own and not necessarily reflective of the Institute or the Ministry)
The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect those of this publication