The Ministry of Education, Heritage and Arts (MEHA) has joined with the Land Transport Authority of Fiji (LTA), the Fiji Police Force and Total (Fiji) Pte Limited to embark on a new road safety education initiative, the VIA programme.
Minister for Education, Hon. Rosy Akbar, and her team, along with the LTA CEO, Samuel Simpson and the Managing Director of Total Fiji, Kazi Rahman, officially launched the programme at Marist Brothers’ High School on Wednesday (17/3/21).
“The VIA program is a flexible, cost-effective, easy to integrate and easy to access Road Safety Education program, that has been jointly developed by two global corporate mobility giants, namely, Michelin and Total,” said Minister Akbar.
“The program was designed for children ranging from the ages of 10 to 18 years and it aims to reach 100,000 young people worldwide over a 3-year period.”
“So far, it has been successfully deployed in large countries such as France, Cameroon and India and is in the process of being deployed in 10 other countries. We look forward to its success in Fiji with the help of our partners.”
Minister Akbar stated that unfortunately there have been many cases where Fijian children have been involved in road incidents, often ending in fatalities.
“Too many times, we have come across situations where our young ones have shown a blatant disregard for road rules,” said Minister Akbar.
The Minister added that in recent years, Fiji has seen a steady increase in the number of vehicles on Fijian roads, which also increases the risk of accidents.
“We have seen our young ones jaywalk across our roads with earphones on and barely paying attention to oncoming traffic and their surroundings. We even have reports of children crossing the roads at night, unsupervised and wearing dark clothing, becoming almost invisible to drivers.”
“This needs to change.”
“We cannot take the safety of our children on the road for granted. Through this program, we will empower our young ones, by first teaching them about why their risky behaviour can lead to, then showing them how they can avoid traffic-related injuries. We need them to understand the benefit of safe behaviour on the road - it is to protect their lives.”
The VIA program provides four learning modules related to feeling, knowing, creating and implementing, along with learning materials that include detailed manuals, fact sheets, worksheets, games, videos and quizzes to achieve this goal in a way that organically appeals to children.
The program was launched globally in 2018 by Total and Michelin and was developed with the help of the Global Road Safety Partnership (GRSP).
Minister Akbar thanked Total and Michelin, as well as the GRSP, for their assistance, saying that their contribution was greatly appreciated and the Ministry looked forward to making it safer for our children on the roads through this innovative program.
She also reminded parents that they are their children’s first and primary educators and she urged parents to take up a more active role in teaching their children the importance of road safety, and to always ensure their children are supervised when travelling, if possible.
“Our children are our future, which means that it is our duty to take all the necessary steps to protect them. This is an important aspect of that duty, and I ask that you help us in keeping our children safe.”