AUTO MECHANISM AND ROAD ACCIDENTS

Road accidents cost nation $288 million. This was the chilling story as told by the chairman of the Board of Directors of the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority (DVLA) in Ghana and reported by newspapers in Ghana recently. The $288m 2008 does not include the direct and indirect cost of road accidents to relatives of victims – wives, husbands, mothers, fathers, children etc - such as funeral costs and the cost of having to do without loved ones and breadwinners. Through road accidents, many children and other dependants of victims have become destitute. Companies, businesses, state institutions (departments, hospitals, schools and colleges, universities etc) have lost many experienced and competent employees through road accidents. The cost of road accidents for the current year has yet to be released. We are all holding our breadth to see what the figures for the coming years will be.

Suffice it to say that motor accidents have enormous negative social and economic consequences, especially in a third world country like Ghana which has no strong state support system that assists the injured and relatives of deceased victims of road accidents. What makes Ghana’s situation worse is that majority of the people do not have life and disability insurance policies from which they or their dependants can get some financial support when they are involved in accidents.
The above very distressing situation thus calls for drastic intervention by the government and its agencies like the DVLA and the Police and indeed all citizens to play their role in ensuring drastic reduction in road accidents in Ghana. It is very heartening that the DVLA is at long last taking the initiatives to address the problem – undoubtedly one of the biggest concerns and fears of every Ghanaian. Let’s hope that the new initiatives will make our roads safe.
Much has been written already about road accidents in Ghana and how to curb it. This article is intended to reinforce the importance of the subject matter and offers some more suggestions on long term solution to road accidents.
Rehashing the causes of road accidents:
One of the problems that readily comes to mind is - how some of the current drivers plying on Ghana’s roads (and those at whose hands countless souls have been lost or maimed) obtained their driving licenses and how road-worthy certificates were issued for the many vehicles that have been involved in road accidents or are still plying on the roads.
With the stark statistics about the number of road deaths or people injured and the staggering cost of road accidents, I am sure the conscience of any DVLA official who compromised on his/her sacred duty to ensure that only competent drivers were issued with licenses and only road-worthy vehicles were passed – should be pricking him or her. Those who took bribes and issued drivers’ licenses must be smelling the blood of many innocent passengers who have died on their hands. And the daily cries of widows, widowers, orphans, mothers, fathers and disabled victims of road accident should be giving them sleepless nights.
It is a known fact that some DVLA officials even sell ‘international drivers’ licenses’ to Ghanaians living abroad which they subsequently convert into genuine drivers’ licenses in the countries they are living. Some of the holders of the fake international driving licenses that I know have died in horrific road accidents.
The first major cause of road accidents in Ghana is poor driving skills. I have witnessed this many times as a passenger myself. Other causes are the normal ones we know very well:
• shoddy work by auto mechanics
• Driver fatigue (dozing behind the steering wheel)
• Drunkenness by drivers
• Over-speeding by motorists
• Defective vehicles
• Overloading
• Poor roads
• Non-existent road markings and signs

Although the above stated causes are some major causes of road accidents in Ghana, but then the question is how far we have gone to fine the main core causes of it. Mostly, Ghanaians base their arguments on the above causes and forget the main ones. We know auto mechanics are there to solve automobile problems for us. But then how far have we gone to see whether indeed they do more harm than good for us.

The auto mechanic industry has been among the industry that has grown for the past years. Majority of the youth who find themselves out of school delve into this industry. Due to that, professionalism in this industry has been in a diminished stage. Most o f the youth who find themselves in this sectors do not concentrate much on the work but rather on the money they accrue. They turn to do shoddy works to faulty vehicles in other to get quick money. Vehicles that are brought to them for diagnoses are rather poised with diseases. Day-in day-out, repaired automobiles from the so called professional mechanics ply our road and cause a lot of threat to human lives. The so called professionals feed the faulty automobile with faulty car parts for them to ply our roads, and due to that, Ghanaians are always faced with the unusual news on our various media channels.

Its time the government together with the road safety commission come together  to set  down strict measures and rules that will be used to govern the daily activity of the  auto mechanic industry.
 Lastly the government should set up a ‘road accidents fund’ into which a percentage of the taxes on fuel and toll roads revenue will be paid. All road accident victims – dependants of deceased victims and seriously injured passengers - may be paid some money from the fund. The payments will go a long way to ameliorate the hardship families’ face due to motor accidents.

THE CONTROVERSY BETWEEN AUTO MECHANICS AND THEIR CUSTOMERS

An auto mechanic is like a wizard when it comes to your car’s constant presence on the road. They can be as significant to the life of your car as a doctor is to your life. Whether you have a jalopy or a new vehicle, a good auto repair mechanic that takes good care of you and your car is worth their weight in gold.

Car parts and labour can be dear when you are getting your car fixed, so you want to make sure that you get the best deal that you can. You also want to be sure that the auto mechanic you use is honest and reliable.

In some cases you might find mechanics who want to make a little extra money and they may cut corners at the garage. This means that they may create more problems for an unsuspecting car owner by replacing a bad part with a used part.

Although this is illegal, some mechanics do this so that the owner will have to bring the car back again for the problem to be fixed. If a garage is known for doing something like this, word will get around. Sometimes an owner will tell mechanics to do this in order to make more money. If you find out that a shop has the reputation for these types of activities, it is not a good idea to go to that shop.

Many people are victims of these circumstances due to the caliber of mechanics we depend on to service our vehicles. Upon an interview with a taxi driver who had to bring his car for repairs at the Kotobabi auto mechanic shop, he lamented that, his car had been putting up the attitude of abnormal jerky movements while changing gears. Due to that, he had gone to the mechanic to deal with the malfunction.

Two months down the line, he is still chasing the mechanic for his car which cannot even roar to life, let alone breath. “This guy has demobilized me. Now am jobless. When I have a car sitting in his workshop. I don’t know what I will do to him. If I get hold of him. It’s not fair. Why couldn’t he tell me he couldn’t handle it”, he lamented.

Moreover, vehicles and technology are gradually evolving, and great mechanics stay on top of these changes so they can best serve their customers. Mechanics should be able to use variety of technical  tools to diagnose and address a wide variety of vehicular problems.

THE ROLE OF THE SPARE PARTS DEALERS IN THE AUTO MECHANIC BUSINESS

With the nature of the auto mechanic business, spare parts dealers have also played a vibrant role in the development of the auto mechanic business in Ghana.

For a decade, the auto mechanic business has come across numerous problems in the sector.  More and more people in the industry disclosed that the spare parts business is no longer lucrative as then, and due that, more challenges and problems are being transferred to the auto mechanic business. An interview with Mr. Kenneth Amponsah a spare parts dealer at the Abossey Okai attributed the situation to the fast depreciation of Ghana’s local currency.

According to him, within he mid September last year, the rate of a dollar against the cedi GH 2.20 but now GH2.40, which he said is making it difficult for them to buy parts of vehicles to sell in the country.

He lamented that, if this trend continues, many of the spare parts shops at Abbosey Okai will be forced to fold up as the owners will not be in a position to raise enough capital to buy auto parts. he then urged the government to establish the cedi against the dollar. Just recently, the president of the Association of Youth Auto Spare Parts Dealers (AYAPD) also took the opportunity to remind the government on the need to reduce change and import duties at Tema Habour.

Again, Mr. Kenneth did lamented that another problem that is really facing their business is the invasion of foreign investors in the spare parts business. He said, more of inferior and low quality parts are brought into the country and being sold at cheaper price. Due to that, more Ghanaian auto mechanics go in for the inferior spare parts due to it low price rate.

Explaining his reasons, he said, if customers are unable to buy from the qualified or authorized auto parts shop, it means that, they will buy “damaged and spare auto parts” from the so called auto parts dealers as scrap dealers, who mainly sell bad items. and by that they will end up creating problems in the auto mechanic business and their business as well.

HOW THE WORK OF CITIZEN JOURNALISTS AFFECT TRADITIONAL MEDIA

INTRODUCTION:

The media landscape has dramatically changed over the past decade, with traditional media (e.g. newspaper, television) now supplemented by social media (e.g. blogs, discussion, forums).Over the past years, new media or social media has given a new shift to the concept and motives of journalism. This work seeks to explain how this new media and social media have been beneficial to us and how it has affected the traditional way of carrying out media and how this media houses have strategized to meet up with the changing trends of reporting news and media as a whole.

SOCIAL MEDIA:

 Social media refers to the means of interaction among people in which they create, share or exchange information and ideas in virtual communication and networks. Andreas Kaplan and Michael Heinlein define social media as a group of internet based applications that build on ideological and technological foundations and that allows the creation and exchange of user generated content. This interaction and sharing and easy communication has been made possible by “NEW MEDIA”.

NEW MEDIA:

 New media has enhanced social media effectively. Social media includes Facebook, twitter, Foursquare, YouTube etc. With all these developments, ordinary people who are supposed to be traditionally oriented (Radio, TV, and Newspaper) all have gained access to digital technology and the internet of which they have subscribed to many social media.

 Examples of some traditional media (television/ radio/ newspaper) often leave the audiences out of construction of news. The rise of social media in one way or the other has made journalists out of every individual. This is where we come across the term “CITIZEN JOURNALIST”. Citizen journalism is also known as public, participatory, democratic or guerrilla journalism which is based on the society playing an active role in the process of collecting, reporting analysis and disseminating news and information. New media technology such as networking and media sharing websites in addition to the increase in prevalence of cellular phones, have a made citizen journalism more accessible to people worldwide, citizens can often report breaking news more quickly.

EFFECTS SOCIAL MEDIA ON TRADITIONAL MEDIA:

There has been a rise in greater accessibility rate of news due to their availability of the new media/social media. Because of the rise in social media, people or audience are able to access news faster and easier due to social networking sites such as Facebook, twitter. Before one of those traditional media news outlets would carry a crew  to go video the event that had occurred , an audience with a glance will quickly video it and just share it on the various social  media or networks.  Likewise the traditional media or the mainstream media who would have been at the scene would rather get the second hand of the news. Audiences are everywhere at any time and at any moment whatever happens around them as news worthy would be captured faster than the mainstream media would have done. With all the above points and the introduction of social media, it is fair to say that the traditional media has lost its influence on the human society causing its decline. But these traditional media or mainstream media have not just been watching but recently have taken strategies to help them meet the current media changes.

It is believed that we are witnessing the emergence of powerful new voices and networks which can act independently of the traditional media and the term “the fifth estate” has been developed due to this emergence of powerful tool which has given voices to people.

STRATEGIES MEDIA HOUSES HAVE TAKEN.

Since the Asian Tsunami in the London bombings when audience footage led the main news bulleting for the first timer the BBC has invested heavily in the current audience to contribute direct experience in major events. It establish a well-staffed user generated hub,to process and authenticated audience material as well as to engage  more deeply with audience members to co create content, write articles and shoot  photos. In average week the team process over 10000 email content, 1000 stills in up 100 videos.

 Traditional media outlets have gone from their usual way of presenting news to audience by adding and incorporating social media tools in order to aid their course. Television outlets, radio and newspaper all have Facebook, twitter, YouTube and others which they feed with update news on these social media outlets for their audience to view.  

Most media houses now have online service whereby audience can now view their programmes online with their devices. This has helped to bring their audience closer. Media houses now engage citizen journalist by allowing them send in their videos and stories which makes them part of the news process.

 This media houses have used various methods to meet this media changes. Polls where readers are asked to make multiple choice or binary response. Message boards which engage readers on threaded online conversations or database on topics often initiated by readers. Have your say, audience comments and stories, question and answers segment, blogs, your media and your story. All this features have aided this media houses to keep in touch with time.

CONCLUSION:

In a nutshell, new media in relation to social media has given the world a closer way of getting closer to each other and interacting in the best possible way, providing people to access news in wider and faster ways.  The Egyptian Riot is an example of peoples power through social media, which was used to organised and rally people to become a strong mobile force which ultimately ousted a dictator.  (Facebook, twitter).  This media houses have noticed the power of this social media outlets and have now strategized and taken measures to incorporate them into their work.

REFERENCES:  Kaplan Andreas M., Heinlein Michael (2010). "Users of the world, unite! The challenges and Opportunities of social media". Business Horizons53 (1). p. 67LISTER, M (2009).

NEW MEDIA: A CRITICAL INTRODUCTION. LONDON, ROUTLEDGE.

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