It’s next to impossible to make politicians, influentials obey law: OQ

Road transport and bridges minister Obaidul Quader on Monday said that it was next to impossible to make politicians and influential people go by law.
Ordinary people are easy to be persuaded to abide by law but the ‘extraordinary’ people do not pay heed to any appeal, he said at a meet the press programme.
The programme was organised by Dhaka Reporters’ Unity at it office.
The ordinary people obey traffic laws while it was almost impossible and very difficult to make the ‘extraordinary’ people obey traffic laws, Obaidul said.
He said that in the past few days — during the Eid holidays — people died in traffic accidents like ‘flies and birds’ due to reckless driving and that he, as the road transport minister, could not avoid responsibility for this.
He said the drivers drove recklessly to increase their number of trips and also because of the good condition of roads.
He also cited lack of training of drivers and corruption in issuing licence as reason of reckless driving.
Without service lane it would not be possible to reduce traffic accidents on highways, he observed.
The minister said the capital’s footpaths must be given back to the pedestrians while there were about 15 lakh rickshaws out of which less than one lakh had registration.
It was his challenge to bring order to the road transport sector, he said.
He said the government was planning to construct service lanes besides
all highways, removing black spots and turning about 17,000 kilometre two-lane roads into 4-lane roads.
The programme was attended, among others, by DRU president Jamal Uddin and general secretary Raju Ahmed.

News Courtesy: www.newagebd.net