In Malawi motorists are information starved

One day, as I was driving from Lilongwe to Blantyre, I decided to use the by-pass road. From Old Town, I took the road to Likuni and joined the by-pass road by the round-about near Chinsapo. About 200 metres on (on the by-pass road), I was waived down by traffic police officers who had mounted a speed trap. They said I had been over-speeding.

I could neither substantiate nor counter their claim as I did not know what the speed limit at that particular section of the road was. I found it rather intriguing that driving through Area 3, one could not see any sign post alerting motorists that they were approaching the by-pass road and informing them what the maximum speed on that road should be. It only happens in Malawi.

As you drive towards Blantyre City on Chikwawa Road you are greeted with a nice sign post at Green Corner, which welcomes you to the city and further instructs: “Observe the speed limits in the city”. It is odd, however, that as you drive further towards Blantyre City Business District (CBD) you do not come across any sign posts advising what your speed limit should be. Which speed limits are supposed to be observed, as per the huge sign post at Green Corner, is something that is way beyond me.

It may be that once upon a time such signposts were erected on the roads in question, but have subsequently been vandalised. But that can hardly be an excuse for not displaying vital information on our roads. It is better, in my view, to bombard citizens with an overflow of information (so that if they err it should not be as a result of not being informed), than to let them be information-starved and be embarrassed by police officers who accuse them of overstepping speed limits they are not aware of.

One of the police officers on the by-pass road said: “The speed limit here is 60 kilometres per hour. All roads in town have that limit.” All roads in town may indeed have a certain speed limit, but is the by-pass road in town or it goes around town? Citizens need to know this kind of information. To me the by-pass road is the equivalent of the M25 that goes around the city of London.

When I was a youth, I used to get puzzled by people who put up signs on their gates, which read: “Chenjerani ndi agalu (beware of dogs)”. ‘Are these people not giving away their secret. The fact that they are protected by dogs should surely be kept a secret and whoever is inclined to misbehave will be pounced upon by the canines before they even suspect them,’ I used to think.

No, I was wrong. The people needed to be informed so that if they should get hurt, they should meet the misfortune from a position of knowledge. Knowledge is power. When people are appropriately informed, it will be their choice to heed the warning or to ignore it to their own peril.

Elsewhere in the world, if the police are patrolling a section of the highway, there will be signposts all over the place informing motorists of police presence. If any motorist errs, it is purely their choice. Here, they would rather take you by surprise and take advantage of the scanty information on our roads.

I have, in my earlier articles, lamented the lack of elaborate signage on the M1 Road, where the branch to the Chongoni Rock Paintings is. This is just one example of the numerous posts missing or not given enough prominence on our roads. If you are a stranger to Blantyre, you can be looking for Glyn Jones Road while you are already on it. Where our streets are named, the best place to find those names is on the map, not on the street itself.

I know that our culture is steep in the oral tradition but some information just has to be inscribed and put in the right place. I do not think it is right to let motorists guess the speed limits between Green Corner and Blantyre City Centre, for example. It is incumbent upon the relevant authorities to provide that information, and to replace it if it falls victim to vandalism or other misfortune.

Let us search within our cities and identify all the missing information on our roads then arrange to get such information mounted, if we cherish orderliness that is.