A total of 359 people lost their lives through road crashes in the Eastern Region between January and December 2012, as against 270 people killed during the same period in 2011.

Police Chief Superintendent James Sarfo-Peprah, Eastern Regional Commanding Officer of the Motor Traffic and Transport Unit (MTTU) of the Ghana Police Service, disclosed this to the Ghana News Agency (GNA) in Koforidua on Friday.

He said a total of 1,706 accident cases were reported during the period with 2,739 people getting injured. Mr Sarfo-Peprah said out of the number of people who were killed, 224 were men and 66 being women.

He said 1,319 commercial, 818 private vehicles and 216 motor bikes were involved in the accidents, adding that the number of pedestrians who were knocked down during the period were 351, and.

Mr Sarfo-Peprah expressed concern about the continuous increase in the number of accident cases in the region with fatalities in spite of all the numerous road safety education campaigns his outfit undertook last year.

He said one major gift that drivers could offer Ghanaians this year was to ensure accident-free roads or drastic reductions to minimise the tauma people went through for losing family members most of who are bread winners.

Mr Sarfo-Peprah called on all the major stakeholders in the transport sector to strive to eliminate the human errors that often led to accidents to ensure a reduction of preventable road crashes. He also spoke against the conduct of motorists and other road users such as pedestrians, motorcycle riders and cyclists that had been identified as the causes of road crashes.

The MTTU Commander advised drivers and other road users, especially commercial drivers, against excessive speeding, drunk driving, driving under the influence of hard drugs, non-maintenance of vehicles, driving tired, wrong overtaking, engaging one hand on mobile phones while driving and other unacceptable practices.

He said road safety was a collective responsibility and urged passengers and drivers to always remember to wear their seat belts and to observe traffic regulations.

Mr Sarfo-Peprah urged drivers to adhere to traffic regulations and avoid overloading, speeding and wrongful overtaking.

He said his outfit was putting a lot of measures in place including increasing road visibility, especially at the accident prone areas in the region aimed at reducing road accident cases in the current year.