Officers were on the Yaounde-Sombo highway over the weekend to check excesses by motorists.
Recognising that over-speeding is the most recurrent highway offence and greatest cause of road accidents, gendarmes have not been taking the heat off motorists. Teams from the National Gendarmerie headquarters in Yaounde on January 23, 2016, deployed on the Yaounde-Sombo stretch of the highway linking the political capital and the economic heartthrob, Douala.
They were led by Col. Ekongwesse Divine Nnoko, Inspector Number One at the National Gendarmerie headquarters, who is Supervisor of the road safety campaign. Speaking to journalists at the Sombo Checkpoint, about 167 km from Yaounde, Col. Ekongwesse said 12 motorists were booked in two days for over-speeding. He noted that the road traffic campaign is appreciated by the public, but most motorists are still to understand their ‘driving environment.’
The Colonel explained that this entails paying enough attention to the state of the vehicle and road, and avoiding over-speeding and the use of worn out tyres. “The public must realise that the road safety campaign is for their sake. It is a partnership between the National Gendarmerie and motorists. Gendarmes are there to help drivers understand their environment and reduce the rate of accidents,” he pointed out. “Our new strategy consists in strengthening what we have been doing with modern equipment and retraining officers to cope with evolving security challenges,” Col. Ekongwesse Divine Nnoko noted.
Still at the Sombo Checkpoint, under the command of Captain Biessala Luc, the unit head, gendarmes frisked passengers and luggage, using metal detectors, while more sophisticated detectors were rolled under vehicles to find out if there were any explosive devices on board. Overloading, the state of fire extinguishers and passengers’ identity papers, were all checked and cross-checked.
Earlier at the Makoda Checkpoint, about 120 km from Yaounde, Captain Fortu Divine Koffi and his men kept watch. An officer told Cameroon Tribune that imported extinguishers should be used for a maximum of one year in Cameroon. He explained that given the humid climate, fire extinguishers tend to lose their potency faster, unlike in Europe which is much colder.
